



-* o o 

t ^ C)' ° 

O'- s"‘ ’«'*'& """ v N\v.o, "> " ^ 

V ^ * *P -w <? t>* * 4 ^ 

* ’•*-'- '*'• • <?; p A' «*• rA s- Ai r ' ^ c,- 

' _ t-'' A r —i -h x \ z 

* ^ >. A< </> 


>, 00 ^ * 

V" cv> c b '* 

x* < VJ o «y 

& s S * * / 'AC. 0 "* 0 


^ V-wK*" ** 

N. ■ ’2L •* 0 . v * <C, V 


^ ''5/ y 0 a V 

* v 1 « 4 ^ ^ t o 

* 'A 0° * 

— * . <■> 

S*: -bo' : 

A ^ 

c*v ^ ^ O 

*>- * 8 > A * ^ 0 

'' 

*> A * 

° ^ <V 

21 



O y ^ 

<y ~ o 


7 3 N o 
* ^ 


- "W* 


° A^‘ A. ° V/Wy\ 

A . , . V 2/„ y 0 » K 


* V 

,0^ C° NC * % 



^ y 0 „ X ** A 6 \ ^ ' * , s - v 

"« ? o -o ? ‘Y'*'^ / 

- *bo' ^ V* 

^ ° ?S ■’rf- v 





% 

V- Y 

ft 0 A 




G . ' /n >o 


A> \ * 


‘*W 


<* 


> 



. w . 7"\ - 

*r^' ^ fa, ■ 

*> A ' " l ^l* ' b - 

■- / ' ■ 


y 0 + k 


y 

'of 


\V r/> 

a\ v .p. 

\ ^ J o » K 

1 « v 8 « 7 o f\ 

^ % ° 0 ,* 

v ; ^ -7*^ * •&* 

y ■*-* * 


•» -^r 

o / * \l ' rl* I '-ZsfyV ~ ' ’ 

v %* 5 “° V^ V*"'- ,/ 

' ^ -* *' 


n .» 

o ^ cS 



vX^ ^,/x o t fvys^A vV ^ 

- * ^ ”i ,* 

^ ' o , * * 4 0 n , 

/X V 4 c 0 N C 


✓ ^.’h >0? > \ v ^ + 

y v C^ i- 

* 0 N 0 

O V f.^ 0 / > 

> rf c» « 


? ^ .a^u v ' ° k w o 0 V 

- - ^ % y **m±* a 0 

^ v '/ffiA't ,>b o' „°% 

- - *' ' ' * \ 00 -,. *¥rf*' v '= „-i -v - > ; 

3 ^ o>' ^ % 7 A V 

, "> #1 1 o> s^ 0< 


^ <- n' q 

^ A * 

* * * ^ * ' %y *Jfe* ^ y 

. ^ . 


>$ ^ 


r .$ v 



** 7 .% , ’» 0 ' y r 

^ r 

*r J>(\ \ > 



^ *f’ : y ,;;; , .. ; : 

" " tl-i ■- A' y, % ° ! WM3 I 

N 0 „ * * * ' « v 1 B q ^ Y 0 * K * < V o N C 

<snl i '3 C° 

£b> * 

nS 




. \ 



^ *f . ^ r s .\ 

+ ^ f 





I v ^' ' f lr>. ° 

' ^ ^ 


v 0 o. 

A ✓ 

\ 

o. /- O f\0 C‘ g> * a ; 

^ * 0 /• " 8 1 ' ‘ v^ s s ’. ‘ '^o * 3 N 0 \>^ ^ 

AV ^ rA V <; Ai r ‘ ^ ^ * <r' t As 

V' ,\X « ■;> y$ry y ' "yr* ^ w < j ; A 1 <A 

>" ^ '* wm + ^ % \ 

\ y o * ^ \6 <* ^ 

V - 0 ^ t 0 N c * V 

V - -v- ~*rrs>* - - 




A -v ^ ^ "7 

V * tiG o N c C / / * * s ^ A X _ V I B 

O v C m ^ V S> ^ K ^ G 

* r^Wv ^ ^ f-6 V X /V?^ ^ 0> 

V2 <* JI- >-^ ✓ r~ V *c ikftif..^ <o 






# ^ ; 


0 X 



"Ci- 


^ V 


*>^ V 

o 0 


vl 






%4 


a < 3 , - Wnsif& " J ' p - • * v* ^ 

X * / s s «'\ '^L * 0 » k * <0 

0 N c "<£ v^ V * v a * / o_ . 0 ' ^ 0 ' ■ ^ 

\ ^ flK/f///, . 2 L -p h. . , u ^“ 

'^o' * '■ v.; 

, . . V- 



0 0 A 


A o 'S' c~?~ 

% z * ^ 

4 ' A J 'f‘- 


4 

4 


V 

3 e* 


A v ,J ,> © in 

* * ^ V^V V * 

S c^ N ^ , »<\ y "^ ,i 0 ^' t 0 N C * % 

Sr A * s 2 C< * ^ * v - 

& ■* *0 o x v ® ^ ^ ^ * 

'"' ** r ^ - , * 

^ '- ^ 'A*, % / ; 

V”*‘Vc° 

o 


c, «^, 

v *%> 



0 o, * = 4 ^ ; &~mm*} • \' 

‘ •*• ',v*5>' > ^ «£. * «|Pv t\ ^ -,"• 

^ 3 ' * CL* < 5 ^ ^ c \ fv ’ y b 0 

% * » » •’ /„ ,.., % /V ■ ; : *V • - 0 A 

' **. <-. r ^ A A * y*SSV« \X* 

s 0 ^fil - * *4 

- ,^-V °\> > W* - * A 

• v - . '« NF ' A A K ■ > r ^ o> 

■ ^ ^ -v, s <* ' A O, y 0 * \ * A) 

0 $ c 0 “ 0 * '<P ‘ <4 N*‘ 1 ' *, °-, 0 

• *v^k,'. ^ ^ > °o' t 

“ : \° °*. 

* a c . 

S _\ 0 ‘ 0 ; 9 .0 N o 

% 


*■ * ^ N . <s> ' 1 * * ' N \ . V 

f»\ c 1 '/^ ,-J^ v“ l . 

r (^ /O * 


, 0 * 


c> / * 

1 - 0 , *>>'*''* 0 > s s " v '* "C‘ 

c <* .'tS' ^ a ^K> 

£> a, o <\ * « <f‘ n .a 

V . />•, C ^ C. ' j : j 1 '■ '.'il---'-' < rji ,<f\ 

af- ./^. . 

^ * ' N !# ^ -i c>' - a 


f® 4 1 o x : s^F 

A rf, 

c . '^ l ^\.' ^ 

-O. * 0 N ° 1 ^ * « , 

S*' 1 ,, V V 0 0 A 

^t / ^ r S%e^ ' v> r $1 5 l „ *_ ./, 

: 0 St\° % 

v >% '.Wm* #' 

■»'4 C,V oM c <</* ' t . ' 1 ^ lt 

,- 0 ’ c° n ^ ^ A* s* 

,+s V ' ; ^ ' A. 

' «o' ° ' ? v*W - 

^ v \V ^ ^ X// 

<* cK ^ 

s. ^ * 0 A > 


0 O 

L XT' 


3 * X 


^ \ 
o 0 


vn 


J -y\ 































































■ 



















WE WERE GOING OVER THE BAR 







CASTAWAY 

ISLAND 


By PERRY NEWBERRY 



Illustrated by 
F. A. Anderson 


THE PENN PUBLISHING 
COMPANY PHILADELPHIA 

1917 



COPYRIGHT 
1917 BY 
THE PENN 
PUBLISHING 
COMPANY 



Castaway Island 



SEP 13 1917 

©C1.A476014 



To 

my youthful nephew , Smith , in the hope 
that the adventures of his coming 
years may all have happy solutions , 
this book is dedicated 




/ 


Introduction 


U P to a very short time ago, the Galapagos Is- 
lands were little known and were considered 
of value and interest only to scientists. Then, 
with the opening of the Panama Canal, their position 
in the Pacific gave them importance, and Ecuador, to 
whom they belong, sent over a governor and a colony 
to Charles Island, or as the Spanish named it, Santa 
Maria. 

So it must have been prior to that when our hero 
and his friend found refuge from their tiny raft upon 
this island, and the dogs and horses and cattle must 
have been left there by the settlement of General 
Villanil, who in 1832 founded the colony of Floreana 
there, naming it after the president of Ecuador,- Juan 
Jose Flores. This settlement lasted but a few years, 
the men going back to Ecuador ; but they left their 
cattle and goats, horses and sheep, dogs and cats to run 
wild over the hills and in the forests. 

But over on Chatham Island, which also has a 
Spanish name, San Cristobal, there has been for many 
years a convict settlement, a kind of open-air prison, 
and the governor of Chatham Island has an army. 
Once, when a schooner with scientists stopped at Chat- 
ham Island, the governor asked the captain of the 

5 


Introduction 


ship if he would carry his army across to one of the 
near-by islands, and the captain, desiring to accommo- 
date him, asked how many trips it would take the 
schooner. “ My army is six strong,” declared the gov- 
ernor, proudly. 

In 1903, according to the official census of Ecuador, 
there were 400 people on Chatham Island— principally 
convicts — 115 on Albemarle, known also as Isabela, 
and three on Charles Island. Throughout the rest of 
the islands and islets of the group — and there are five 
large islands and ten smaller ones — there were about 
a thousand people. 

Unlike most other lands, there never has been a 
native population of aborigines or Indians. When 
first discovered early in the sixteenth century by the 
Spaniards, they were entirely uninhabited. The Span- 
ish navigators named them the Galapagos, because of 
the huge land tortoises they found upon them, Gal- 
apago meaning tortoise in Spanish ; and gave the in- 
dividual islands their Spanish names, Isabela, Fer- 
nandina, Santa Cruz, San Cristobal, San Salvador and 
Santa Maria. Then, a little later, English buccaneers 
or privateers — they were a great deal alike in those 
days — found the islands and named them all over 
again : Albemarle, Narborough, Indefatigable, Chat- 
ham, James and Charles. One of these bold seamen, 
Hugh Liborges, made a map of the group, a rough, 
unfinished drawing, and for many years that map was 
all that Englishmen knew of the Galapagos group. 

6 


Introduction 


Liborges’ map, shown at page 300, is very rudimentary. 
The map at page 95 is, in its general outline and main 
details, based upon late surveys of Charles Island. 

For scientists, the Galapagos Islands have always had 
a deep interest since Charles Darwin the great English 
naturalist visited them aboard the “ Beagle ” in 1836 
and wrote of their strange flowers, birds and reptiles in 
his 14 Journal of a Naturalist.” There are many birds, 
flowers, lizards and the giant tortoises, which are found 
in no other spot on earth and must be studied there to 
learn their habits. So the islands have been and are 
now visited quite often by ships bearing scientific ex- 
peditions from various countries, and the first interest 
is in the mammoth tortoises. One was measured fifty- 
six inches long on its upper shell, and the long neck 
and legs made it much larger. Nowhere else have 
such monsters been found, and even those of the Gal- 
apagos are rapidty becoming extinct. 

Although right under the equator, the islands are 
not so warm of climate as this would indicate, for sea 
breezes and currents cool the rays of the sun, and in 
the higher altitudes — for there are quite lofty moun- 
tains on the larger islands, — the weather is usually 
pleasant. The year is divided into wet and dry sea- 
sons, and, of course, there is no snow. 

So, if one had to be shipwrecked and find a Castaway 
Island, it would be difficult to discover one in these 
modern times better adapted to a new Robinson Crusoe 
than Charles Island — or Santa Maria, if you prefer the 
7 


Introduction 


Spanish name — of the Galapagos group ; and all that 
is told of the happenings on Castaway Island in the 
following pages might have happened on Charles 
Island. 


The Authok. 


Contents 


I. 

I Find a Friend 


• 

4 

• 

*3 

II. 

The Big Wind . 


• 

• 

• 

24 

III. 

The Cozy Oil Cask . 


• 

• 


40 

IV. 

We Get a Dinner Out of 

the Air 

• 

4 


50 

V. 

u It Is Land ” . 


• 

• 


62 

VI. 

The Island 

• 

• 

• 

• 

76 

VII. 

We Find Wild Chickens . 

• 

• 

• 

• 

87 

VIII. 

The Great White Light 

o 

* 

• 

• 

101 

IX. 

The Lake by the Woods . 

• 

• 

• 

• 

III 

X. 

The Dogs . 

• 

• 

• 

• 

124 

XI. 

The Marching Feet 

0 

♦ 

• 

• 

136 

XII. 

In the Nick of Time 

• 

• 

• 

• 

145 

XIII. 

Fighting the Wild Pack . 

• 

• 

• 

• 

156 

XIV. 

The Great Turtles 

• 

• 

• 

• 

iyi 

XV. 

My Heel Finds an Oyster 

• 

• 

• 

• 

184 

XVI. 

My Fire Goes Out . 

• 

• 

• 

• 

197 

XVII. 

The Long Shot 

• 

4 

• 

• 

209 

XVIII. 

I See a Strange Smoke 

• 

4 

• 

• 

222 

XIX. 

A Coward’s Shot 

• 

4 

• 

• 

236 

XX. 

Invaders of the Valley . 

4 

4 

♦ 

• 

249 


9 


Contents 


XXI. 

Besieged .... 

* 

« 

• 

. 265 

XXII. 

The Battle of the Hut . 

4 

4 

9 

• 275 

XXIII. 

Black Prince 

• 

• 

• 

. 287 

XXIV. 

The Battle in the Gulch 

• 

4 

• 

• 299 

XXV. 

Conclusion 

e 

4 

• 

• 3 1 1 


v 


10 


Illustrations 


We Were Going Over the Bar . . 0 

It Was Bucking Like a Live Thing 

Map of the Island 

“ A Lake ! ” Cried the Captain 
I Had the Fire Burning . . • 

He Was Within Easy Range 

Hugh Liborges* Map of the Galapagos Islands 


. Frontispiece *^' 

PAGE 

• 37 

• • 95 V 

. . 116^ 

. 188 / 

. . 247 

3 00 


Castaway Island 



CASTAWAY ISLAND 

CHAPTER I 
I FIND A FRIEND 

r U ^HEY had buried my mother that day. In the 
little graveyard back of the American consu- 
late, over which floated the stars and stripes, 
they had laid her away in a foreign soil, and I had 
found a hidden bench in the Plaza where I might sob 
away my grief. I was a small, sorrowing stranger in a 
city whose people spoke a different language and were 
^of different customs and manners. 

Except for the trained nurse who had made the 
journey from San Francisco with my invalid mother, I 
knew no one in Guayaquil. The American consul, who 
had offered to read services and say a prayer at the 

13 


Castaway Island 

burial, appeared to me almost as foreign as the native 
Ecuadorans, and although I do not doubt his kindli- 
ness of heart, an equatorial sun and South American 
associations had made him an alien in looks and 
feelings. 

I was alone among strangers. Grief at the loss of the 
one parent I had known, the mother who had been all 
in all to me, was intensified by this loneliness, and the 
hotel, where dark-skinned men and black-haired women 
talked words I could not understand, became unendur- 
able to me. I ran away to the park beside the bay, 
where I might look out across the water toward my own 
home land. The park was deserted at this noon hour 
of siesta. The grass plots, watered by revolving sprays, 
steamed in the heat of the tropic sun, and the white 
roads and pathways reflected back its glaring rays. 
Finding a bench half shaded by a palm tree and 
screened from view by a fringe of cacti, I threw myself 
down, face in my arms, and wept. 

I was aroused by a greeting in Spanish, a question 
that I did not understand, for I knew nothing of the 
language, and looked up through my tears to find a 
man standing before the bench ; a man who was big 
and tall and the strangest figure that I had seen in all 
this strange land. It was not any oddity of face, which 
seemed kindly despite a heavy dark beard and a great 
sweeping mustache, with a complexion of sun-tanned, 
brown and eyes that twinkled with humor ; but he was 
costumed like a pirate or brigand in a story. Upon his 

14 


I Find a Friend 


head, over curly hair, was a tattered straw sombrero, 
and his coat, ragged and torn, was a blue mess-jacket, 
such as I had seen upon soldiers about the hotel, but 
very much older and worse for wear. His trousers 
were of once white flannel and his feet were bare, 
except for queer, strapped sandals. 

But his armament was oddest. He stood there lean- 
ing upon a staff which was longer than himself, and he 
must have been well over six feet; a peeled sapling 
of some dark wood, worn smooth with much handling, 
its smaller end steel-pointed for a foot of its length. 
Although he evidently used it as a staff, it was a fierce- 
looking weapon for any Zulu chief. But it was the 
least important of this man’s armory. 

In contrast to the dirtiness and ragged condition of 
his clothes was a bright, shiningly clean rifle which 
hung, muzzle down, from his shoulder, and a short, 
straight sword in scabbard at his side. About his 
waist was a belt filled with cartridges, and it supported 
a heavy revolver in its holster. There was the handle 
of a knife protruding from another sheath on his belt, 
but its effect was offset by the ends of fork and spoon 
which indicated culinary, rather than warlike uses. 

Again he spoke to me in Spanish and I shook my 
head to indicate that I could not understand. Sad as 
I was, there was something in his face and voice that 
made me wish I might comprehend him, could talk 
with him and make him my friend. I certainly 
needed a friend. 


i5 


Castaway Island 

He turned to go, then suddenly faced me with a 
smile of such geniality that I could not but respond. 

“ You — you’re not American ? ” he asked. Then, 
“ No such luck ! ” 

“But I am,” I answered quickly, jumping from the 
seat. “ Of course I’m American.” 

“Well, by jiminetty!” he exclaimed. “United 
States — and crying his heart out here in an Ecuadoran 
plaza. Why, boy, I’m U. S. myself! ” 

“ I’m glad ” 

“ Shake ! ” he interrupted, taking my hand into his 
great one. I felt the warmth of friendship go through 
me at the clasp. “ Proud to know you, boy.” He 
straightened up to full height and brought his heels 
together. “ I am Stimson — Jeffers Stimson, late of 
the Presidente’s Guard, formerly of Saginaw, Michigan, 
U. S. A.” 

“ I am Robert Trevlin of San Francisco,” I said in 
turn, and again he shook my hand and gave a happy 
laugh. 

“ And I know that town, too, almost as well as 
Saginaw — from the Ferry to Twin Peaks and from Fish- 
erman’s Wharf to the Potrero. Where do you live ? ” 

“ On Pierce Street — or we did. I suppose I do yet. 
I don’t know.” The question had brought remem- 
brance of my loss ; all my life I had lived with my 
mother in this San Francisco home. Now she who 
had made it a home was gone. Tears that I could not 
hold back welled up to my eyes. 

16 


I Find a Friend 


Jeffers Stimson drew me down on the bench beside 
him, a strong arm across my shoulders. “ The mother 
gone ? ” he asked, softly, and at my nod, he pulled me 
close against him, saying no more for a time. Then, 
when I had calmed my sobs, he spoke to me gently, 
asking me questions of her and myself, learning with- 
out seeming inquisitiveness how alone I was in Guaya- 
quil, how much I was in need of a friend. “Now, what 
are your plans ? ” he asked, at last. 

“ I have made none,” I replied. “ It all happened 
so suddenly, and I have been so sad. Then, this 
morning, Mrs. Miller — she was mother’s nurse — told 
me she would stay down here. She has a good posi- 
tion offered in the government hospital.” 

“ You’ll go back to San Francisco? ” 

“ I have relatives there — Aunt Mary and Uncle Jim. 
Mother told me to go there to them.” 

“ They’ll kind of help you to get used to it. I’m 
going to Frisco, too, just as soon as I get a decent 
rig-out.” He glanced down at his ragged clothes. 
“ When does the next steamer sail ? ” 

“ In four days.” 

“ What boat ? ” 

“ The 1 Mariposa.’ ” 

Stimson scratched his curly hair thoughtfully. “ I 
suppose I might go up on her,” he said, at last, 
“ though I had figured on getting away on some steam 
schooner, and work my way by stevedoring or shovel- 
ing coal. Somehow ” — he smiled cheerily, — “ I hate to 

17 


Castaway Island 

waste good money paying fares. You wouldn’t want 
to come with me ? ” 

I thought it over a minute before replying. I knew 
that my mother’s death had left me rich, and I had 
experience enough in my sixteen years of life to realize 
that heaving coal in the boiler room of a coasting 
schooner was not what my relatives would expect of 
me. I could see Aunt Mary hold up her hands in 
horror of the idea, and Uncle Jim, immaculate in 
creased trousers and white vest, cry with a shudder, 
“ Impossible ! Not for a Trevlin ! ” But still I 
thought it over. 

“ Could I do the work ? ” I asked, at length. 

Stimson felt my biceps, then laid a hand hard on 
my chest. “ Take a good, full breathe-in,” he com- 
manded. “That’s it. Plenty of lung room there. 
You haven’t consumption, sure. You will do, though 
you’re not in prime condition ; just a bit soft.” 

“ You think we could find jobs ? ” 

“ Not a doubt. They are always looking for strong 
men willing to work in these South American ports. 
Is it a go ? ” 

“ Yes,” I replied, deciding quickly. “ If you are 
willing to take on a boy and a green hand. I do not 
know how to do a thing and, maybe, I shall be nothing 
but a nuisance ; but if you really want me, I will go 
with you.” 

“ Settled then,” said Stimson, grasping my hand 
again. “ Where are you stopping here ? ” 

18 


I Find a Friend 


“ At the Planters’ Hotel.” 

“ I’ll make that my headquarters. I’ve just hiked 
in from Quito and haven’t placed myself yet. Sup- 
pose we walk up there now — or perhaps I had better 
go ahead alone. I’m hardly fit to be seen, in these 
ragged regimentals.” 

“ I don’t mind, sir,” I cried eagerly. “ We will go 
together and you won’t need to get a room. Share 
mine.” 

“ Thanks, Robert, but I’ll find my own bunk for the 
few days I’m here.” We started across the Plaza as he 
continued : “ I’m far from being broke, although I 
certainly have all the appearances. You see I’ve nine 
hundred dollars Mex. in my belt, worth just about half 
that north of the Rio Grande. It is the savings from 
three years of fighting and waiting for fighting in this 
great, little republic of Ecuador. It came hard, and 
getting it paid wasn’t the easiest part, either.” He 
laughed at the recollection. 

At the Plaza gate, the trim, gold-laced civil guard 
came to quick attention at sight of my ragged friend 
and gravely saluted, Stimson making answer by a 
touch of his finger to his ragged hat brim. I might 
have believed it a humorous whim of the guard, had 
not an officer on horseback, laden with epaulets and 
trappings, brought his hand up sharply to his chapeau 
as he passed us. Again Stimson replied with a care- k 
less salute, never pausing in his talk or seeming to 
notice these signs of respect, so incongruous with his ap- 

19 


Castaway Island 

pearance. When we entered the office of the Planters’, 
two soldiers at one of the little tables jumped hur- 
riedly from their chairs, standing at attention, hands 
to caps, as we passed in. I had seen enough of 
Ecuadoran military etiquette to feel certain that no 
ordinary soldier was entitled to such attention, and 
this new friend of mine gave me food for thought. 
Dressed like one of Captain Kidd’s pirate crew, armed 
like a bandit, believing four hundred and fifty dollars, 
a life’s saving, was a fortune and ready to work in a 
boiler-room to save steamer fare, he was saluted with 
greatest respect by the city’s military police and the of- 
ficers of the army. It was confusing. 

I left him in the office while I sought out Mrs. Miller 
to tell her of my new friend, and I went to our apart- 
ments convinced that these incongruities would settle 
themselves in time. I would not question him, but 
wait for his confidence. Gladly would I have paid his 
steamer fare to San Francisco for the sake of his com- 
panionship, but somehow I knew that the offer must 
not be made to this ragged soldier of fortune, who 
believed himself rich in worldly goods and thought me 
the poor and dependent one. I must leave him in that 
belief and accept his proffered friendship, needing it so 
greatly, on his own terms. 

Mrs. Miller had packed my mother’s effects to be 
shipped home and was waiting for me that we might 
arrange final plans. She was surprised at the change 
in my looks and manners in the short time of my 
20 


I Find a Friend 


absence, for I had left her after the funeral, prostrated 
with grief. Eagerly I told her of my new friend and 
his offer to take me back to San Francisco, and I was 
alive with energy and enthusiasm. 

“ I must see him before I decide so important a 
matter,” she answered, and my heart sank at the re- 
membrance of Stimson’s unprepossessing appearance. 
She would never permit me to leave with him, even in 
regular manner on the “ Mariposa.” 

“ We shall meet him at dinner,” I said, but I was 
certain she would not approve. She would see the 
rough clothes and uncouth guise of my friend and 
never find the kind heart behind them. She might 
even refuse me further acquaintance with him and 
while she had no real authority over me, I should 
hate to disobey her. She had been a kind friend as 
well as loyal nurse to my mother, and until word came 
in answer to our telegram to my uncle, she would 
remain my protector. That no answer had yet come 
was not so strange in this country of careless methods ; 
the wires might be down or some operator on the line 
oversleeping his siesta. 

We went down to the great dining-room, filled with 
heavy perfumes of many tropic flowers, a little before 
the time set for meeting Stimson, but I looked anxiously 
around the tables of the caf£ as we entered. The room 
was well filled, but I saw no sign of my friend as we 
followed the bowing head waiter across to our table. 
Then I heard his voice. 


21 


Castaway Island 

“ Robert? ” he called, softly. 

I turned quickly, but even then I did not recognize 
him until he came to me. It was Stimson, but so 
different a Stimson, with hair trimmed, beard and 
mustache gone, and clothed in a neat suit of flannels ; 
only the great height and massive frame remaining of 
the ragged man of the Plaza. I looked at him in 
amazement, too surprised for words. 

“ Don’t you know me, Rob?” he laughed, and I 
recovered my wits to introduce him to Mrs. Miller, my 
fears all gone. I had never doubted that he was a 
gentleman, but now he looked a gentleman. 

“ I am glad that Robert has found you to be his 
friend,” said Mrs. Miller, inviting him to a seat at our 
table. 

“ I thank you,” he replied, “ but I have a friend 
with me now ” — he motioned to a near-by table. 
“ May I join you later — at coffee ? ” 

He left us with Mrs. Miller’s permission, and I saw 
him take the chair beside an officer in the uniform of 
one of the Presidente’s household. While we ate, both 
Mrs. Miller and I cast glances that way, to find Stimson 
smiling amiably always and the officer evidently urging, 
talking low but excitedly. 

“ You did not tell me that Mr. Stimson was an 
officer,” Mrs. Miller said, speaking low that he might 
not hear. 

“ Is he that? ” I asked. 

“ Of importance, evidently,” she returned. “ The 
22 


I Find a Friend 


gentleman with him is very high in the Presidente’s 
council. Your new friend is a man of position in 
Ecuador.” 

I smiled as I thought what a difference a few clothes 
made and was glad I had not told Mrs. Miller the 
extent of Stimson’s fortune. In a few minutes he 
joined us, while his companion made a low bowing 
exit from the cafe. He took a chair between us while 
a waiter brought him coffee. 

“ It seems good to talk U. S. again,” he said, smiling 
happily. “ For the last three years I have seen so few 
of my countrymen that I might easily have forgotten 
the language. Has Robert told you we are going 
partners on the up-trip ? ” 

“ Yes. I suppose you sail on the ‘ Mariposa 1 ? ” 
Stimson glanced at me. “ Well, no,” he replied. 
“ I think we’ll probably find some boat leaving sooner 
— a coaster, perhaps,” and at her satisfied smile, he 
changed the subject and it was not referred to again 
Mrs. Miller was pleased with him, glad that I had 
found a congenial friend of such good appearance and 
evident respectability, and before we had left the table, 
was convinced that she had provided well for my safety 
and happiness. 


23 



CHAPTER II 
THE BIG WIND 


I WALKED beside Stimson to the quays next morn- 
ing and on the way we determined the manner of 
our homeward trip. “ We’ll settle between ourselves 
just what we are willing to do for a free ride to the 
States/’ he said, “ then hunt for that. A job in the 
engine room, stoking coal, wouldn’t go badly with me, 
but it would probably break your back. On the other 
hand, you are light on your feet and would be of real 
use on a sailing ship. So let’s decide for the sails.” 

“ Very well,” I replied, although I doubted my value 
even with sails. 

" It will take longer to make port,” continued Stim- 
son. “ Are you in a hurry ? ” 

“ Not a bit.” 

" Nor I ; a week or a month don’t matter. So we’ll 
sail up and enjoy the cruise. Is it settled ? ” 

24 


The Big Wind 

“ Settled, Captain,” I replied. 

He looked at me sharply. “ Better not call me cap- 
tain aboard ship,” he said, smiling. “ Jeffers or just 
Jeff would sound better and provoke less argument.” 

“ Excuse me,” I said hastily. “ It just slipped out. 
I knew from the salutes you were an officer.” 

He said nothing for a minute, glancing over the 
harbor where several ships lay anchored or tied against 
the docks. When he did speak it was of them. “ She’s 
a Swedish brig,” he remarked, pointing at a square- 
rigged vessel pulling at its chain as though anxious to 
get away. “ She’ll be bound south for the Straits when 
she sails, homeward bound. Yes, Rob, I am, or was, 
an officer.” 

“ I knew that,” I repeated. 

“I’ve resigned; just quit.” He raised his arm to 
indicate another ship far out in the gulf. “ The three 
master yonder is a whaler, American, I judge, provi- 
sioning or looking for men. None of that in mine, 
thank you ! Prison is better than a whaler, generally 
speaking. We won’t tackle the whaler for jobs.” 

“ What’s the boat beside the sea-wall ? ” 

“ A schooner and U. S. Maybe loading for Frisco. 

We’ll find out. Robert ” he placed a hand on my 

arm. “ I suppose you sometimes think you’d like to 
be a soldier ? ” 

I nodded. I had, often. 

“There’s just one good excuse for it,” continued 
Stimson, “ and that’s when the flag floating from the 

25 


Castaway Island 

stern of that schooner is in danger. I know, for Fve 
fought under other flags and found it was only another 
name for butchery.” 

“ You were a captain ? ” I asked eagerly. 

“ I was leader of a regiment of ragged fighters they 
called the rag-bag brigade, because we spent all our 
clothing allowance for ammunition.” Stimson smiled 
as he headed me down the wharves toward the schooner. 
“ They weren’t much to look at, as you who saw me 
yesterday might guess, but they could fight ! They 
were honest men, too, fighting under their flag for 
what they believed was right. I was the crooked one 
of the regiment, for I fought for pay and excitement. 
But I’m through with it — forever.” 

“Who was the man last night — at dinner?” I 
asked the question without thought of impertinence, 
and Stimson smiled as he answered. 

“ The Presidente wants me to stay, and they have 
offered me higher command with better pay to take 
charge of his guard. He was urging my acceptance.” 

We had approached the schooner, which proved to 
be the “ Sally B ” of San Francisco, as we could read 
on her counter, but there was no one in sight on her 
decks, and Stimson asked a driver of one of the wagons 
hauling cargo to load her where her captain might be 
found. The conversation was in Spanish and Stim- 
son’s “Come on, lad,” at its conclusion was the first 
word I could understand. I followed him across the 
quay to the street which overlooked the Embarcadero. 

26 


The Big Wind 

“ Somewhere in one of these caf&3,” explained Stim- 
son, “ is Captain McCloud of the noble schooner 
‘ Sally B.’ She is supposed to be loading for Frisco 
and he is supposed to be overseeing it ; but neither is 
happening. He has caught the manana habit of the 
southlands, where they never do to-day what may be 
put off till to-morrow, and his crew has the same dis- 
ease. It kind of looks as though he needs us.” 

After some search and numerous inquiries, we found 
Captain McCloud at a table in the shade of an awning 
in front of a caf6 with a tall glass in front of him. He 
looked cool and placid, as though there were no troubles 
in the world and the lading of the “ Sally B ” was a 
matter of no consequence. From his chair, he could 
see the piles of cargo from the emptying wagons grow 
higher with each load and the lines, swinging loose 
from the schooner’s hoist, unworked, indicating that 
his crew was idle. 

“ Morning, Captain,” Stimson greeted. “ Want to 
hire two huskies to put your cargo aboard ? ” 

Captain McCloud looked him over carefully from 
head to feet, then shifted his eyes to me in a shorter 
survey. “ States ? ” he asked, gruffly. 

“ Yes, and want to get back,” replied Stimson. 

“ Good enough. No place in the world like the States. 
Grand country,” grunted the captain. “ That crew of 
mine is drunk — all drunk. Pigs— just five drunken 
pigs ! I’ve had Lascars and coolies, Fijians and Kana- 
kas, but these are the worst ever ! Work ? They don’t 
27 


Castaway Island 

know what work is ! You want to earn your way to 
San Francisco ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ All right — all right ; good enough. Glad to find 
white men that can work. And the lad ? ” 

“ The two of us,” said Stimson. “ We go together. 
He’s strong, active and able.” 

“ All right ; good enough. Know anything about 
lading?” 

“ Me, yes ; I’ve sailed and stevedored. The boy’s 
green.” 

“ All right. Could ye take charge of the lading 
there ? What with the heat and trying to handle five 
mescal-lined, drink-absorbing human pigs, I’m about 
done up.” 

“ I’ll take on the job and make that crew of yours 
work if there’s an ounce of life left in them,” said 
Stimson, grimly. “ But it’s understood that the lad 
and I get passage and cabin fare to San Francisco.” 

“ All right ; all right; good enough. All understood 
and agreed. I’ll rest here till the cargo’s in. We’ll 
sail with the tide in the morning if she’s laden. 
What’s your name? ” 

“ Stimson.” 

“ Not ?” 

“ Yes, Jeff Stimson. And this is Rob Trevlin.” 

Captain McCloud came to his feet with exaggerated* 
dignity. “ I’m proud to meet you, Capitaine,” he said, 
holding out an unsteady hand to Stimson, which he 
28 


The Big Wind 

shook briefly. “ I’ve heard a good deal of you, here- 
aways. Proud to have you aboard.” 

“ Thanks. Come, Bob,” and Stimson led me back 
'to the wharf, while the captain returned to the con- 
templation of his tall glass, muttering “ All rights ” and 
“ Good enoughs ” at the hot and empty air. We, 
newly engaged stevedores, made our way through the 
piles of cargo and jumped easily to the deck of the 
“ Sally B.” There was no one in sight. The schooner 
was flush-decked, with a small cabin aft and a large 
fo’castle with a galley at her bows, but there was none 
of the crew in any of these, although there were indi- 
cations of their occupancy of the fo’castle. Several 
empty bottles and blankets from the hammocks littered 
the floor. 

“ They have probably made off for town where there 
is more of this stuff,” said Stimson, kicking a bottle. 
u The captain sets the example and the crew follows 
his lead. It seems as though we had struck a pretty 
rough boat for homeward-bound, Bob.” 

“ You think it will be safe ? ” I asked. 

“ Safe enough, yes. They’ll sober up when we get 
to sea and we can handle her until they do get sober. 
I’ve seen this same kind of lugger ; all hands drunk 
ashore, brisk enough when sailing.” 

Stimson pushed the cover, already loosened, from 
the midships hatch and motioned me to look below. 
In the empty hold amid loose straw lay five Ecua- 
dorans. That there might be no mistake about their con- 
29 


Castaway Island 

dition, several empty gin bottles lay with them. Stimson 
surveyed them with an expression of extreme disgust. 

“ Throw me that hoist-line,” he cried to me, dropping 
into the hold and I obeyed, guessing correctly at the 
unfamiliar term. “ Now, Bob, when I give the word, 
hoist away. We'll jerk Captain McCloud's crew out 
of our way, at least. Haul away I ” 

I threw my weight on the down-pull and was sur- 
prised at the ease with which the sailor came up 
through the hatch. The combination of pulleys gave 
me an immense advantage of strength, and I held him 
sprawling in air while Stimson climbed up from below. 
He was chuckling gleefully. 

“ Sea bathing is what he needs for his disease,” he 
laughed, swinging the inert human bundle out over 
the side. “ Salt water immersion will probably cure 
him. Let her go, Bob.” 

I dropped the rope and down ran the body, making 
a great splash as it struck the water. After a few 
seconds, Stimson hauled in until the sailor’s feet were 
high in air, and again let him go. Five times he 
ducked the man, and it was only after the fourth time 
that there was evidence of life; then he came out, 
gasping and choking and feebly kicking his legs about. 
After the fifth immersion, he yelled loudly for mercy, 
and we swung him in on deck. 

No sooner had Stimson untied him than he sprang* 
with Spanish curses to his feet and whipped out a 
clasp-knife which seemed to open by itself as he drew 
30 


The Big Wind 

it. Then he crouched as though to spring on the big 
American, but Stimson did not wait for the attack. He 
ran in, striking from the shoulder, his big fist tight 
clenched, and the Ecuadoran went down with a groan. 
I picked up the knife, which had flown half-way across 
deck and, trembling all over with the suddenness and 
fury of the assault, handed it to Stimson. 

“ Too bad, Bob,” he said with a comforting smile, 
quiet and cheerful. “ I don’t like to be rough, but he 
would have it. Sprinkle him with a cupful of water 
from the butt by the fo’mast.” 

I did and the sailor came to with the splash of it on 
his face. Stimson, standing over him, spoke sternly to 
him in Spanish and he slouched, befuddled but obe- 
dient, into the hold and attached the line about the 
body of another of the crew. One by one we hauled 
them out and soused them into soberness. Some re- 
quired but the one ducking, others several, but it was 
an efficacious remedy in every instance, and before noon 
siesta five able seamen were assisting in the lading of 
the “ Sally B.” There were no other symptoms of 
mutiny among them ; the man who had first attempted 
defiance of Stimson’s authority had evidently advised 
against a repetition of the experience. 

The cargo was principally olive oil in barrels, which 
were rolled upon a net on the dock, then hoisted aboard 
by the crane and lowered into the hold. I checked off 
from the manifest as each barrel came over the side, and 
I rolled them into place below decks, and when Cap- 

31 


Castaway Island 

tain McCloud came grunting down the quay late in the 
afternoon, he could not but approve the progress we 
had made. By six o’clock all cargo was aboard and we 
began on the stores, a lighter job which was finished in 
an hour. At McCloud’s suggestion, Stimson got up 
sail and worked the schooner a mile or more into the 
gulf, where we dropped a light anchor, McCloud disap- 
pearing again in the direction of his caf6 and tall glass. 

Stimson and I pulled ashore in the tender, leaving 
the crew safely aboard the schooner, which Stimson was 
certain from investigation was barren of any liquors, 
and we walked together to the hotel for dinner. I was 
dead tired from the hardest day’s work I had ever 
done, but it was a good, wholesome tired feeling, and I 
had not had a minute all day to brood over my grief. 
After a hearty meal, I felt much refreshed and, arrang- 
ing to have my trunks forwarded on the “ Mariposa,” 
settled my bill at the hotel and joined Stimson with 
only a small bundle of the things I should need aboard 
the schooner. 

He glanced at the meagre bundle and smiled, hold- 
ing out a similar package tied at the end of his great 
staff. “ That with my war utensils constitutes my 
household goods,” he said. “ I’m leaving Ecuador with 
the same 'size bundle as I brought into the county, 
though I’ve considerably more cash about me, so should 
be satisfied. Suppose we walk down to the front and 
take a parting look at Guayaquil by gas-light.” 

We had plenty of time, so strolled leisurely past the 
32 


The Big Wind 

Plaza where we had first met, now lively with a gay 
throng of promenaders keeping unconscious step with 
the music of a band amid the palms, and wandered out 
through broad streets whose shops, brilliantly lighted, 
swarmed with Spanish men and women. It was the 
busy time of Ecuador’s day, and the population which 
had dodged tropic sun rays was making up for lost 
time. It seemed a happy, hearty people, inclined to 
merriment and music, soft chatter and smiles. Here 
and there were tinkling guitars and dancers often used 
the hard pavements in lieu of ballroom floors. 

We had finally come out on the Embarcadero when 
I saw two men dodge hurriedly into a caf6 and believed 
I recognized, in the hasty glance I had of them, 
members of the “ Sally B’s ” crew. 

“ Stimson,” I cried, clutching his arm, “ did you see 
those men ? ” 

“ No,” he answered, stopping short. “ Why ? ” 

“ They were — I am almost sure they were from the 
ship.” 

“ The schooner ? Hardly, Bob. They wouldn’t swim 
ashore.” He started on, then stopped again. “ How- 
ever, we’ll see.” 

We pushed through the screen doors into the caf6 I 
had seen them enter. There were many men, many 
sailors sitting about the tables, but no one from the 
“ Sally B.” “ I must have been mistaken,” I confessed, 

and we made our way to the quay. 

Stimson’s instructions were to await Captain McCloud 
33 


Castaway Island 

with the tender and take him aboard, so we sat down 
at the edge of the stone wharf and waited his arrival. 
It was an intensely warm night, even for Guayaquil. 
No breath of air stirred here at the water’s edge and the 
stars above us looked close and big, as though they too - 
radiated heat. It was a sultry atmosphere and I was 
sleepy. 

“ Coil up on the stern thwarts there,” commanded 
Stimson, pointing to the boat, “ and take a nap. I’ll 
look out for the captain and wake you when he comes.” 

I was only too willing to obey him and in a minute 
was far away in dreams to be brought back by his ex- 
clamation, “ I’ll be jiggered ! ” I jumped to my feet in 
time to see the captain navigating a very crooked course 
down the quay. “ Drunk ! ” muttered Stimson, but he 
hurried to meet him and assisted him into the boat, 
pulling away at once to the schooner. We could see 
her riding lights swaying gently in the wash of the 
gulf, and were soon aboard, Stimson helping the cap- 
tain into his cabin and boosting him into his berth. 

He rejoined me in a few minutes with a pair of blan- 
kets and made us up beds on deck at the stern. “ It 
doesn’t look much like sailing out with the early tide,” 

I heard Stimson say to me, but I was too sleepy to 
either reply or care. That was my last recollection, that 
and vivid stars bright and close above me, the Southern 
Cross. I awoke in a deluge of water, crushed by a great 
weight and hurled, all crumpled up, against the stern 
bulwarks. I was so wrapped and twisted in my blanket 
34 


The Big Wind 

that I could not move arm or leg. Helpless I lay whi]e 
wave after wave swept over me, almost drowning me 
each time, pounding me back and forth against the 
bulwarks. 

“ Bob ! ” I heard Stimson call, and somehow I an- 
swered him. In another moment he was beside me 
and had lifted my head above the rush of the water. 
“ Hang on to me tight, lad — hold hard now,” he 
shouted in my ear. I could not hold hard or hold at 
all. I was like a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes 
or a mummy in its yards of cloth, helpless. Another 
sea came over us, the “Sally B” heeled to port and 
together we rolled to the rail. Stimson kept firm hold 
of my blanket and with his other hand grasped the 
mainstay. So holding, he rose to his feet and lifted 
me above the water that swept over the side. 

“ Hurt, Bob?” he asked in an anxious shout above 
the shriek of the tempest. 

“ No,” I howled back. “ Get me free of these 
blankets and give me a chance ! ” 

I heard him laugh, but he pulled away the enfold- 
ing blanket. With release of my limbs, I lost that 
horrible suffocating fear of helplessness and might 
have broken into a merry jig had not another fierce 
wave broke quartering, sending a deluge of water down 
upon us that would have carried me with it had not 
Stimson held me close against him. Then the schooner, 
its bow swinging closer into the wind, righted some- 
what and we made a dash for the after hatch. 

35 


Castaway Island 

“All hands on deck! All hands ! ” came a roar 
from behind us that made the hurricane seem tame. 
“Up, ye rum-soaked Greasers! On deck with ye, or 
go down to the bottom ! ” Captain McCloud was at 
last on the job. 

He caught sight of us at once, just as we were ready 
to leap down the cabin hatch. “ Keep above, ye 
fools ! ” he shouted. “ H’ist the jib, or the ‘ Sally ’ will 
capsize the next squall ! Where’s the men ? ” 

“ Haven’t seen any,” howled Stimson back at him. 

“ Drunk, as usual ! Lend a hand here and we’ll get 
a rag for’d so we can run for it. You, lad, to the wheel 
and hard alee. Mate, lay on the jib halliards.” 

The captain was none too sober himself, as I could 
see as he and Stimson made for the foremast to hoist 
the jib. The schooner’s deck was at almost every angle 
as she pitched and rolled, but she was not taking water 
aboard as she had at first and I reached the wheel 
without being battered to the rail. I had no idea what 
hard alee meant or even how to handle the wheel, 
but I grasped hold of it with both hands and began 
revolving it to right. “ Port ! Port, you lubber ! ’» 
shouted the captain, so perceiving that I was wrong in 
my guess, I reversed the process and pushed hard down 
with all the strength of my arms and weight of my body. 

The darkness of the night, all the stars hidden be- 
neath the canopy of black clouds, was relieved by a 
white radiance from the spume of the breaking waves. 
I am not sure they shed a light; it may have been 
3b 



IT WAS BUCKING LIKE A LIVE THING 


mm 







The Big Wind 

reflected glow, but to me they seemed phosphorescent 
as they towered and broke around us. It was an eerie 
light, strangely white and shadowless, and by it I could 
see Stimson and the captain forward, Stimson at the 
halliards, the captain on the sprit loosening the jib. 
Then there was a flutter of white sail and a crack like 
a gun shot as the wind caught it and drove it taut. 
“ Haul there, blast ye ! Haul away ! ” I heard the 
captain shout at Stimson, and they were his last words. 
I did not see him go overboard. I was too busy hold- 
ing the wheel alee, for it was bucking like a live thing, 
trying to break away from me. 

Stimson told me of it afterward, how Captain 
McCloud started for the foremast just as the schooner 
swung into the trough of the wave, lying over almost 
to her scuppers, and leaped to catch the spar just as a 
great wave broke over the boat, catching him in mid- 
air. His feet never touched the deck. 

The jib held. It was the only piece of new canvas 
on the old schooner or it never would have stood the 
strain. Just that one sea we took aboard as we swung 
around to race with the tempest, and the next minute 
we were before the wind with the breaking billows 
chasing us. 

“ Bob,” cried Stimson, jumping down beside me and 
taking the wheel, “ isn’t this a night? Are you alive 
after it all ? ” 

“ Alive? ” I answered. “ I’m as good as ever I was, 
but what’s the matter with this ocean ? ” 

3 7 


Castaway Island 

“ Matter enough, Robin boy ! It’s a tornado, cy- 
clone, hurricane, typhoon and monsoon, all blown into 
one ! It’s the big wind of Ireland just struck little old 
Ecuador ! ” 

“ Where is it blowing us ? ” 

“ Boreas only knows ! ” He glanced at the compass 
before him. “ We’re heading a little north of west, 
and that means we’re leaving the Gulf of Guayaquil 
behind us at a pace somewhat between those of a coyote 
and an express train.” 

I looked to stern and saw great waves rolling up on 
us, seemingly to crush us. The wind fairly shrieked 
through the ropes and rigging and the sky was like 
ink. It was a terrifying time, and I cowered down 
beside Stimson. 

“Don’t look back, Bob, and don’t get frightened,” 
my big friend commanded. “ Many a strong sailor 
has gone wrong at a time like this and deserted his 
wheel, just by looking astern. Those waves are not 
going to catch us, lad.” 

I hoped they would not, but I was bruised and tired 
and badly scared, and I was only sixteen years old. I 
grasped the spokes of the wheel beside Stimson and 
tried to be brave, but I could not forget those black 
mountains of water with angry fringe of white atop, 
chasing behind us. Stimson talked to brace me up, but 
I had no answers and could barely hear him for listen- 
ing to the crash of the waves astern. All the rest of 
the night, or the early morning, for the storm had 
38 


The Big Wind 

come upon us after midnight, we stood there, wet to 
the skin with the wind off the Andes, chilled by the 
snows, biting through us to the bone. Stimson, hear- 
ing the chatter of my teeth, which I could not hush, 
wanted to go below for blankets, but I would not let 
him. I dared not stay there alone. 

It was four o’clock in the morning and beginning to 
lighten a trifle behind us when Stimson suddenly cried, 
“ I believe we’ve outraced it I ” and I followed his gaze 
astern to see a perceptible diminishment in the size of 
the waves. The wind, too, was lowering, and I gave a 
deep breath of thanksgiving as I saw a break in the 
dark clouds overhead and a corresponding increase of 
daylight. Then quickly, almost as quickly as it had 
come up, the storm ceased. The wind died out and, 
while great seas still followed us, they were not lashed 
into foam and were far less terrifying. Stimson left me 
to handle the wheel, which was behaving much more 
amiably, and went below for blankets, one of which he 
wrapped about me, making me lie down on the cockpit 
floor. “ Get some sleep, Bobbin, for you’ve earned it,” he 
said, placing a second blanket to pillow my head. 
“You’ve been a sailor this night, sure enough, and if 
you sail every night for fifty years, you would probably 
never see worse. But it’s over now — all over but the 
shouting ! ” 

I was asleep while he still spoke. 


39 



CHAPTER III 

THE COZY OIL CASK 

R OB ! Oh, Rob ! Wake up, lad ! ” 

It required loud shouting and vigorous prod- 
ding to bring me back from my dreams to the realities 
of life and I sat up dazed, rubbing the sleep from my 
eyes. The sun shone bright and clear, an hour or 
more above the horizon line which stretched in a great 
circle of sea touching sky all about us. The wind was 
gone and the rags of the jib swayed limply as the 
“ Sally B ” rolled in the long swell of the sea, the only 
visible memory of the storm. 

40 


The Cozy Oil Cask 

“ Take the wheel here, Bob,” said Stimson, and there 
was a note of anxiety in his voice which brought me 
wide awake. “ This old scow seems to be settling, and 
I’m going below to take a squint at her.” 

“ Sinking — are we sinking? ” I gasped. 

“ I want to find out. Maybe it’s only the water she 
took in last night that makes her so loggy,” and Stim- 
son, leaving me at the helm, went down the after hatch. 

In a few moments he came up and hurried down the 
forward companion. When he returned to me there 
was an expression of deep concern on his face. 

“ It’s a bright morning for a shipwreck, Bobbin lad,” 
he said, looking away out to sea. “ If it wasn’t that 
we are sinking, I’d like to go right on sailing a day 
like this.” 

I felt a big lump come up in my throat and almost 
choke me. I looked away from Stimson that he might 
not see how frightened I was or the tears which gathered 
in my eyes. 

“ She’s leaking like an old kettle,” he continued. 
“ With just you and me, there’s no chance to keep her 
afloat. So we’ve got to move, Bob.” 

“ But where are the crew ? ” I managed to ask. I 
still thought them unconscious in drink below decks. 

“ You were right last night ; it was they you saw at 
the caf6, without a doubt. There isn’t a soul aboard 
but you and me, Bob, and the ‘ Sally’s ’ doomed. The 
seams have opened with the racking of the storm, and 
she’s filling like a sieve.” 


4i 


Castaway Island 

“ What are we to do ? ” I cried. “ We must be miles 
and miles from land I ” 

“ You’re right, lad — more than a hundred miles, but 
it’s better being on top of water a hundred miles from 
land than being near land a hundred feet under 
water.” He smiled cheerfully, standing barefooted, a 
straw hat on the back of his head, his hands deep in 
his pockets. “ Yes, Bob,” he said slowly, “ we’re still 
atop and we’ll keep atop. If the 1 Sally B ' won’t float 
as a whole, we’ll have to float a part of her. Now those 
two hatches should keep you and me above water a 
considerable time.” 

“ A raft ? ” I cried, catching his drift. 

“ Bight, first guess. Those two hatches on top of, 
say, six empty barrels would make quite a substantial 
raft. Now, Bob, there are plenty of barrels in the 
hold. Let the * Sally ’ steer herself and you. and I will 
get busy.” He started for the hold, jumping with a 
splash through the hatch. “ Don’t be afraid of wetting 
your feet,” he called back to me cheerily. 

There was knee-deep water in the hold, but we 
waded in and with a hand axe drove in the bung of 
one of the oil casks, letting its contents mingle with 
the bilge. Then Stimson had a new idea, and he 
stopped me as I was about to broach the second. 
“ Leave the oil in them,” he said. “ They’ll float just 
as well, even steadier, and less likely to leak. We’ll 
hoist them over with the tackle.” 

So we lifted these barrels to the deck and laid them 
42 


The Cozy Oil Cask 

in two rows, three casks, end to end, in a row, after 
Stimson had carefully looked to the security of the 
plugs and driven tight the hoops. I was sent to the 
' captain’s cabin in a search for tools, returning with a 
carpenter’s chest and a keg of miscellany, nails, screws, 
spikes and bolts. 

Under Stimson’s direction, I cut the sails from the 
fore and main gaffs and sawed these lighter spars into 
nine foot lengths, one of which was placed at either side 
of the two rows of barrels with timbers bolted across to 
make a solid framework, nine feet by seven, the barrels 
wedged in between. To hold the casks even more 
securely, Stimson bound them to the spars, both around 
and lengthwise of the barrels, using the three-quarters 
inch jib-hoist. This finished, and it was the work of 
two hours under the spur of the necessity of quick 
action, we edged it with levers over the side of the 
nearly water-logged schooner into the sea. 

It floated high, the oil-filled casks lay with a third 
of their diameter above the surface, and when Stimson 
stepped to the spar there was scarce a perceptible lower- 
ing, although his weight was upon one side. With a 
line, he moored the skeleton of the raft to the rail 
while we built it a deck. 

“ She’s fine, Bob lad ! ” he cried, as we hauled the 
I hatches into place and lashed them fast to the frame- 
work of spars, through auger holes bored in the coam- 
ing. “ Plenty of room, floats like a duck, and steady 
as a sand barge. What shall we call her ? ” 

43 


Castaway Island 

44 The 4 Rolling Oil Cask/ ” I suggested. 

44 The 4 Cozy Oil Cask’ is better, for she’s too steady to 
roll. If I had a bottle of salad oil to break over her 
bow, and she had a bow to break it over, we’d hold a 
christening. Hurrah for the 4 Cozy Oil Cask ’ ! ” 

44 Hadn’t we better get aboard without any ceremo- 
nies? The 4 Sally ’ is pretty low in the water.” 

She was, indeed, almost awash with the low roll of 
the sea, but there was so little motion that we had not 
noticed it before. Now Stimson ordered me to the 
raft. 44 Be ready to cut loose the moment I give the 
word,” he said. 44 Use the hatchet and chop the hawser. 
Push well off so the 4 Sally ' will not foul her when she 
sinks. I’ll jump aboard before she goes, never fear; 
and I’ll cargo you before that,” and he hastened away 
to the cabin. 

A cask of water was the first thing placed aboard the 
raft, and it was followed by two casks of sea biscuits, the 
carpenter’s chest and our rolls of clothes and blankets. 
Stimson passed me his rifle and other weapons, warn- 
ing me to place them well away from damp, then 
brought from the cabin an axe, a shotgun, old fashioned 
and muzzle-loading, a small cask of powder, two bags 
of shot, a case of canned meat and a sack each of sugar 
and coffee. From my position alongside, it seemed 
that the 44 Sally ” would sink any minute, and I urged 
Stimson to leave her at once. 44 She’ll sink while you’re 
in the cabin,” I pleaded, 44 and then what could I do ! ” 

He promptly came over the side, untied the line 
44 


The Cozy Oil Cask 

and pushed away from the schooner. “ We can’t get 
all I’d like to take,” he said regretfully, “ but we’ve 
done fairly well as it is, so I mustn’t complain.” 

“ Not when the 1 Sally ’ is settling deeper every min- 
ute,” I replied. “ Let’s get farther away from her.” 

We could not, for we had forgotten to bring away 
any oars. That was an omission of a serious nature, 
so we paddled with a piece of plank slowly back along- 
side and I clambered over the “ Sally’s ” side. I remem- 
bered seeing an oar jammed in with the wreckage for- 
ward, a relic of the ship’s boat which had been carried 
away in the storm. Finding it quickly, I looked about 
for another that we might use with it. 

“ Come down here, Bob,” called Stimson anxiously. 
u Are you trying to commit suicide ? ” 

“ She is steady enough,” I answered, forgetting the 
fears I had when I was waiting below. “ There’s lots 
of stuff here I can bring off.” 

“ You bring yourself off without any more non- 
sense ! ” commanded Stimson, and I could only obey. 

Again we left the “ Sally B ” to settle quietly into 
her grave, and Stimson, using the oar as a scull, put a 
hundred yards or more between us. Then we began to 
arrange our supplies, lashing everything down so that 
no sea might carry it away. It was a warm day, 
though the heat was tempered by the cooler water, and 
we worked throughout the morning without serious 
discomfort, eating a luncheon of sea biscuit washed 
down with a cup of water. 

45 


Castaway Island 

“ The ‘ Sally B ’ is as slow sinking as she was sailing, 
I’m thinking,” remarked Stimson as he lolled at ease 
on a blanket, munching a biscuit and watching the 
slow roll of the schooner, now down to her scupper- 
holes. “ I wonder if she ever intends to go down.” 

“ Suppose we go back and rifle her some more,” I 
suggested, having acquired confidence in her staying 
qualities from my short trip aboard. 

“ We might risk it,” said Stimson, slowly. “ An- 
other cask of water aboard here would make me a trifle 
happier.” 

“ Let’s first decide just what we’re going after, so that 
we’ll lose no time and handle no truck that would be 
useless.” 

“ Good idea. A sail for an awning is my first sug- 
gestion. We might just as well be civilized castaways 
with all the modern conveniences. I saw some cans 
of jelly and a half dozen books in the captain’s cabin.” 

“ Shouldn’t we get the compass? ” 

“ Certainly we should ; also a glass and the instru- 
ments. We’ll have to go back. Give me that oar.” 

Stimson soon propelled the clumsy craft alongside 
the schooner and he climbed gingerly aboard, his 
weight at the side sending a wave of water across deck 
to splash through the open hatches. We waited to see 
the effect, Stimson ready to leap to the raft, but the 
schooner came to an even bottom and seemed no deeper 
down. 

“ There’s air in her below decks somewhere,” said 
46 


The Cozy Oil Cask 

Stimson, “ and it is enough to float her, full of water 
as she is. Make fast to the stern, Bob, and stand by to 
load what I pass you. I’m going to wade into the 
cabin.” 

“ Be careful ! ” 

“ Right O ! Careful it is ! ” he called cheerily and 
splashed down the aft companion into water to his 
chest. 

For an hour Stimson went back and forth from 
cabin to raft, bringing armloads of water-soaked goods, 
and I piled them on the “ Cozy Oil Cask.” There were 
kettles, pans and other movable utensils from the 
galley among the important articles of salvage ; a pin 
cushion, straw hat and a tin candlestick among the 
less useful. At some of the things I laughed loudly, 
especially when Stimson passed over a bundle of old 
newspapers bordering on pulp. “ Put ’em where they’ll 
dry,” he cried. “ With crimped edges they’ll be fine 
to cover shelves.” 

At last everything that could be safely removed was 
aboard the raft. The cargo was too heavy to tackle 
and Stimson would not venture the forecastle. “ It’s 
the air cooped up for’d there,” he explained, “ that’s 
keeping the ‘ Sally ’ afloat. Let that out and good-bye 
‘ Sally.’ Anything else you need or can suggest ? ” 

“ No. Please leave her now,” I begged, for every 
trip Stimson made below I feared would leave me a 
lone raftsman. “ We’ve enough aboard the 1 Cozy Cask ’ 
to start a junk-shop now.” 


47 


Castaway Island 

“ Steady, boy ; don’t get nervous. Here’s rope, can- 
vas, pulleys and tackle that we need right now and 
may need worse later. We’ll step a mast for’d on the 
raft and rig up a sail, and we’ll have a canvas cabin 
aft and be comfortable in our voyaging. First though, 
we must condense our belongings.” 

“ We can throw most of our belongings away,” I re- 
marked, looking them over with a grin. 

“ Not a one — not a single, solitary belonging unless 
we have to and until we have to. We’ll build them 
into a bulwark about the raft ; they’ll help keep us 
dry, we’ll have deck room to navigate and be com- 
fortable as an ocean liner. Catch this coil of line ! ” 

Under Stimson’s direction, I helped build a wall of 
salvage across the square bow and along both sides of 
the raft, and we covered it with the sail-cloths, wind- 
ing them with ropes that lashed them securely to the 
timbers and casks. We raised a spar near the bow, 
staying it securely, and rigged up a square sail about 
eight by twelve feet that could be raised or lowered. 
This was the work of several hours and when done, 
Stimson expressed approval. “ She probably won’t 
steer,” he remarked, looking at the blunt nose of the 
craft, “ and she hardly could be expected to ; but now 
we can use the wind when it’s going the same direc- 
tion we want to go and we needn’t use it when it 
isn’t.” 

The building of a cabin was the last work of the day 
and before we began on it, Stimson cast loose from the 
48 


The Cozy Oil Cask 

“ Sally B,” for the schooner was perceptibly settling 
by the stern and threatened each minute to slip away 
below the water. Our cabin was simple ; a ridge pole 
on two uprights, with a canvas stretched over and 
nailed to the deck, made us a dog-tent high enough 
and large enough to sleep in or lounge in during the 
heat of the day. 

“ There you are ! ” cried Stimson, surveying the 
finished work with a sigh of fatigue and a smile of 
pride. “ She’s done, is the 4 Cozy Cask/ and she’s a 
really-truly craft. She’s neither sloop, yawl nor 
schooner, clipper, brig nor ship, kyak, proa nor cata- 
maran ; but if the wind blows fair, she’ll carry us to 
haven.” 

“ Hurrah for the 1 Cozy Cask ’ ! ” I shouted. The sun 
sank into the sea, a dazzling orange disc dipping into 
the green of the endless waters that met cloudless sky 
on every side. 

“ Look ! The schooner I ” shouted Stimson. 

Gracefully, slowly, lifting her broken spit to the 
sky, the “ Sally B ” slid rudder foremost beneath the 
sea, her masts cutting a wake of white foam. They 
too disappeared, leaving a momentary sheen of bubbles 
on the oil-like roll of the waves. Then, north, south, 
east and west was ocean to the utmost limit of vision, 
a solitude of green waters. 


49 



CHAPTER IV 

WE GET A DINNER OUT OF THE AIR 

T HERE is but short twilight in the tropics. Almost 
with the sun's setting came on the night, moon- 
less but lighted with millions of stars, and as though 
signaled by the passing sun, the first puffs of a breeze 
struck the raft. It was an offshore wind, and Stimson 
frowned as he felt it on his cheek. 

“A breeze that isn't apt to blow us any good," he 
declared, studying the compass. “ We’re plenty far off- 
shore as it is, and we’re not honing for extended travel. 
Let’s hope it comes no stiffer and carries us no farther 
5o 


We Get a Dinner Out of the Air 


away from Ecuador. What do you say to supper, 
Bob?” 

I said supper promptly. I was hungry as a bear, 
and sea biscuits with jam spread thickly atop were re- 
markably fine eating. When we had finished and 
cleared away, we spread blankets over a piece of sail- 
cloth and lay down on deck, but tired as I was, I did 
not feel like sleep. 

“ I wonder how long this breeze will last ? ” I 
ventured as I stared up at the stars. “ We can never 
get back to Guayaquil unless it changes.” 

Stimson did not answer for so long a time that I 
began to think he was asleep. Then he rolled over, 
facing me. 

“ Bob,” he said, soberly, “ I'm afraid this wind is 
going to blow from the east more or less steadily for 
three months. It is the offshore monsoon, and it began 
in the tempest last night.” 

“ How far are we from land ? ” I asked. 

“ At a guess, a hundred and fifty miles.” 

“ And the other way ? ” 

“West? Half the world, probably. Let's see — we 
are almost directly on the equator. You're fresh in 
geography, Bob ; what lands does the equator cross ? ” 

I closed my eyes trying to remember the map of the 
world as it came in my atlas. “ In South America, 
through Brazil, Columbia and Ecuador,” I began. 

“ That last is our starting place ; keep on going 
west.” 




5i 


Castaway Island 

44 I’m trying to think what is next west,” I said 
slowly. 

44 Hits into the East Indies somewhere, doesn’t it ? ” 

44 Yes — cuts Borneo and Sumatra ; but there are 
islands in the South Seas before you get to Borneo.” 

41 The Gilberts ? ” 

44 There’s another group with a long name way this 
side of the Gilberts. It’s Gal — Gala ” 

“Galapagos!” Stimson shouted the word, jumping 
to his feet in excitement. 44 The Galapagos islands ! 
Sure, boy — are you sure the equator cuts them ? ” 

I was sure. I could see that map before my mind’s 
eye with those little specks of islands around the black 
line of the equator. The name was so much bigger than 
the islands that I had always remembered them, know- 
ing nothing more of them than that they lay off Ecua- 
dor and the equator cut the biggest speck. 

Stimson was hauling the square sail to the mast- 
head. 44 We’re going to sail, not drift,” he called joy- 
fully. 44 Make sail, Bob ! We’re on our way for the 
Galapagos.” 

I helped him fasten the stays so the square sail 
bellied to the breeze, and felt the raft take a new mo- 
tion under the pull of the canvas. It steadied as 
though it had work to do, and there was a gurgling as 
the casks drew through the water. Stimson stood and 
watched the sail, feeling the stays of the mast and the 
lashings of the casks, for there was a creaking now as 
the different parts of the crude craft fell into their 
52 


We Get a Dinner Out of the Air 


working places. At the square bow a little wave of 
water pushed against the canvased bulwark, but the 
deck of the raft was dry. 

“ She'11 do ! " observed the captain, shoving the oar 
out astern to act as a rudder. “ Bob, hand me that 
compass and we'll lay a course for the Galapagos." 

I found a little tin lamp, which I lighted, and by it 
we studied the compass. The wind came from the 
east-south-east, so we steered a couple of points to the 
south of west to allow for drift. “ The Galapagos are 
not more than six or seven hundred miles from Guay- 
aquil," Stimson said, “ and as they're directly under 
the equator, navigation is easy. We'll make them 
sure ! " 

“ Are they civilized ? " I asked, taking hold of the 
steering oar with Stimson. He scratched his head. 

“ Bob, I know just as little about those islands as any 
man could, and there aren't many men that know much 
more. Ecuador owns them, but whether they keep a 
colony there, I never heard. However, Robin lad, 
they're land, and there's probably a way to get off them 
if we once get on ; so we're for them." 

“ And we can't sail back against the wind," I added. 

I went to the cabin and to bed by command of the 
“ Cozy Cask's " captain, and slept calmly through the 
first night of her cruise. Stimson, too, slept the greater, 
part of the night, as he told me next morning, being 
too fatigued by the exertions of the past forty-eight 
hours to keep his self-appointed watch of the craft. He 
53 


Castaway Island 

lashed the steering oar and the wind held steady 
through the night. 

I was the first to awaken in the morning, the sun 
already up, and there came over me the lonesomeness 
of this vast solitude of sea. On all sides of our raft was 
water to the edge of the world, water that slowly rose 
and fell in dreadful monotony. We were a lone, little 
speck on the bosom of the sea, so small that it seemed 
we might vanish without there being a noticeable 
change in the ocean’s appearance. It was a depressing 
sensation of littleness and aloneness, and a great sweep 
of longing for my mother caused me to bury my face 
in the blankets and sob. Then I heard a sort of whir- 
ring noise and looked up quickly, startled, to see a 
school of fish, small of body but with large fins, rise up 
from the water beside the raft and by quick motion of 
their tails and lower fins, fly for several rods in the air, 
sinking again to the water. My grief left me in the 
surprise of it and the comfort of this companionship 
on the great sea, these sailors so much smaller than 
were we. 

“ Stimson — Captain ! ” I called, shaking the form 
beside me. He sat up hurriedly, looking first at the 
mast and sail, then at me. 

“ What is it, Bob ? ” he asked. “ Trouble ? ” 

“ No — fish ; fish that fly,” I explained, and told him 
of the occurrence. 

“ Good enough ! ” he cried, leaping to his feet 
“ Fried fish for breakfast. How big were they ? ” 

54 


We Get a Dinner Out of the Air 


11 Not large — about twelve inches long, I'd say. How 
shall we catch them ? " 

“ Shoot them," he replied, going for the shotgun. 
“ I'll show you how to angle for bat-fish." 

“ Bat-fish ? " 

“That’s their vulgar name — flying fish sounds prettier 
and describes them better. Ho ! There they go again ! " 

This time the school — or another — arose from the 
water a greater distance from the raft but still within 
shotgun range had the weapon been loaded and Stim- 
son ready, but they were gone again before we found 
powder and shot among the stores. Then, loaded and 
capped, gun cocked, Stimson stood ready for the next 
flight. I held my breath, waiting, waiting ; then 
breathed again, for I could not hold it longer. Not a 
ripple disturbed the placid swell of the sea. 

“ Fish," remarked Stimson, lowering the hammers of 
the gun, “ are well enough for breakfast, but breakfast, 
fish or no fish, is a better word. There is still jam and 
sea biscuit and — yes ! Coffee ! Shall we forego fish 
this morning, Bob ? " 

“ Ay, ay, sir ! " I answered briskly. 

“Then a good wash first. You swim, Bob?" 

“ Yes, fairly." 

“ Then off clothes and into the big tub," cried Stim- 
son, setting example, and a minute later he plunged 
into the sea, I following in a quieter manner, letting 
myself over the bulwarks. The water was delightfully 
cool and we swam and sported about the raft, never ven- 
55 


Castaway Island 

turing farther than an oar's length away, by Stimson's 
command. The wind had gone down as the sun climbed 
higher, and there was very little motion to the “Cozy 
Cask." 

After a refreshing bath we dressed in shirt and,, 
trousers and began preparations for breakfast. Stim- 
son built a fireplace in the bows before the mast, just a 
little fireplace made with an iron skillet raised an inch 
or so above deck on nails. In this he built a fire of 
splinters and small blocks of wood, and hung the tea- 
kettle above it on a tripod. I was surprised at the ra- 
pidity with which the water boiled over the little flame, 
but Stimson explained that a camp-fire should always 
be small to do effective cooking, and he proved it by 
adding a couple of slices of fried salt pork to go with 
the excellent coffee he had made. We had coffee with 
sugar, sea biscuit and salt pork, and I felt as comfort- 
able as I had been miserable when I first awoke. 

“ Now," said Stimson, when the dishes had been 
washed in the sea, “ the very first thing all shipwrecked 
people do after filling their stomachs with food is to 
inventory their possessions. Here we are — you and 
I — sailing for a desert island, so far as we know, and 
we must list up our supplies." 

“ What shall we find on the islands ? " I asked won- 
deringly. 

“ Turtles, sure. That is what the name means, Gala- 
pagos. I have seen some of the great tortoises from 
the islands in the park at San Francisco." 

56 


We Get a Dinner Out of the Air 


“ And birds and animals, too, I suppose ? " 

“ I should feel certain about birds ; animals, per- 
haps." 

“ What kinds of animals ? " 

“ I can only guess. On the mainland yonder there 
is as considerable a variety of big, medium and little 
beasts as may be met in any jungle on earth. There 
are panthers, jaguars and tiger-cats, any of which would 
be sporty shooting for a big-game artist. There are 
various kinds of antelopes, goats, mountain sheep, and 
many kinds of small game. Any of these or all of 
them may be on the Galapagos. " 

“ Lucky we have firearms / 7 I exclaimed. “ Let's 
begin our inventory with weapons and ammunition / 7 
“ That is Crusoesque. Put 'em down." Stimson 
handed me the schooner log and a pencil. “ One shot- 
gun, which I have here beside me, loaded for flying fish 
which do not fly ; one Mauser repeating rifle ; one army 
revolver, with about fifty cartridges for each." 

“ One keg of powder and a sack of shot," I added. 
“How long will they last?" 

“ That depends on how we use them, but it won't 
frighten me away from bagging some bat-fish. Be- 
sides, Robin, there are other ways of capturing beasts 
and birds besides shooting them, and methods of mak- 
ing weapons of defense as substitutes for guns. If we 
are on a desert island six months, I will have you as 
clever an archer as Robin Hood." 

I remembered Locksley's archery in “ Ivanhoe," and 
57 


Castaway Island 

I smiled, but it was good to have Stimson so certain of 
the happy outcome of things. He did not worry at all at 
the prospect before us, and it was reassuring to me. He 
seemed to think we were supplied with everything two 
individuals might ever need, as we continued to list our 
inventory, which we headed with a short statement of 
the wreck of the “ Sally B ” and dated, figuring back- 
wards for exactitude. He had a word of congratula- 
tion over each pot, kettle and pan, each bolt, pulley 
and screw as it was listed, and at the conclusion, when 
I read it all back to him, he clasped my hand heartily. 
“ Not a bad beginning at all for light housekeeping/’ 
he declared. “ Many a married couple in the populous 
places has started off with less.” 

I closed the log-book to put it away. “ Wait,” cried 
Stimson, taking it from me and opening it to the last 
page. “ This sheet will be our calendar and to you, 
Robert Trevlin of San Francisco, is allotted the task of 
keeping it straight. A line for a week day, a cross 
for Sunday, as Robinson Crusoe did it many years ago. 
Every morning the first thing, you to the calendar. 
Do you accept the responsibility ? ” 

“ I do,” I replied gravely, and I drew the first line 
and marked it with the day of the week and month, 
just as a little puff of breeze sent a ripple across the 
4 water. Another puff, stronger, and the wind began 
again, still easterly. Stimson hurriedly grasped the 
steering oar and after studying the compass, threw the 
u Cozy Cask ” on its course along the equator. It was a 
58 


We Get a Dinner Out of the Air 


light breeze, which would have been a calm to a ship 
and would barely have stirred the sails of a schooner, 
but it pushed us along easily. Stimson decided we 
should have more canvas, so’we rigged up a larger sail 
from one of the “ Sally’s ” tops’ls and hoisted it on a 
spar aft the cabin. It gave us a wake behind and a 
wave of white over our bows. 

“ We’ll try it out,” said Stimson, watching the strain 
on casks and spars with an anxious eye. “ It’s driving 
her a bit hard, but with this wind she can hold it. 
To-night, Bob, we must stand regular watches.” 

“ All right, Captain,” I answered. 

“ You will have the first watch from eight bells to 
six bells.” 

“ What is that by the clock ? ” 

“ You don’t know the nautical clock? ” asked Stimson, 
then smiled. “ Of course not, for your sailing has been 
restricted to wrecks and rafts. Eight bells is eight 
o’clock in the evening, in this instance, and six bells 
is eleven at night. But let’s start at the beginning, 
Bob ; midnight is eight bells, and it begins the day. A 
half hour later is one bell ; one o’clock is two bells, 
one-thirty three bells, and so on up to four in the 
morning, which is eight bells again and the end of the 
first watch. Then we start with one bell again at four- 
thirty. Midnight, four in the morning, eight and 
noon, four in the afternoon and eight in the evening 
are each eight bells, and each eight bells ends a watch. 
Six watches of four hours each.” 

59 


Castaway Island 

I figured it out slowly. “ One o'clock is two bells, 
half-past one three bells, two is four bells, and so on ? " 

“ Yes ; up to eight bells, then begin over again. 
Simple enough, isn't it? 

“ Confusing at first. I have the watch from eight 
bells to six. Why have you chopped an hour off mine ? 
Didn't you say a watch was from eight bells to eight 
bells?" 

“ Yes, but you are an apprentice, and so do not get 
full watches yet. I go on duty at six bells and come 
off at eight ; then I snooze until breakfast time." 

I could see that Stimson was giving me the best part 
of the night for my rest and taking the bulk of the 
work and the bad hours of watch for himself, but for 
fear he might mistrust my watching capabilities I did 
not venture to interfere with his arrangement. I made 
up my mind that I would graduate from apprentice 
into the able seaman class as quickly as possible and 
give him better opportunity for sleep. In the mean- 
time I went through a catechism of nautical time, 
something ]ike this : 

“ What is three o'clock ? " 

“ Six bells." 

“ And half-past eleven ? " 

“ Seven bells." 

“ And half-past five ? " 

“ Three bells," and so on, hit or miss, until I became, 
so expert that bells were almost as familiar to me as 
hours. 


60 


We Get a Dinner Out of the Air 


So the morning hours slipped by, the “ Cozy Cask ” 
plowing her way into the west, and Stimson had just 
suggested dinner when — Whir ! and up from the water 
almost beside us arose a big school of flying fish. 
Stimson dropped the steering oar to grasp the shotgun 
and the bang, bang of the double barrels sounded al- 
most simultaneously. Running to the masts, I quickly 
lowered the sails, and the raft lost motion at once, amid 
a score of white bellied fish, some killed by the shot, 
more by the concussion of the heavy loads. 

“ It is going to be a very fine fish dinner, Bobbin,” 
remarked Stimson as he took off his clothes to retrieve 
the game. 



CHAPTER V 
“IT IS LAND ” 

T HE breeze strengthened steadily during the after- 
noon, and before sundown we were obliged to take 
down the larger sail. Even then the raft made a great 
ado over its passage, churning through the water with 
a groaning and gurgling that reminded me of the com- 
plaining of an old, unoiled lumber wagon. Stimson 
had fears for the lashings of the barrels, always his 
chief concern, for they were the foundation of our 
safety, but they seemed to hold strongly and the wind 
sent us on our way at a lively rate. It was no gale at 
all, Stimson assured me, but we, being so near the 
water's surface, necessarily felt it much exaggerated. 

“ If this wind will hold and the raft will hold," he 
said to me as we ate bat-fish for supper that evening, 
“ it will not be many days before we raise the Gala- 
62 


“It Is Land” 


pagos. The 1 Cozy Cask ’ is not a racer, but she’s 
making six knots or better right now.” 

“ How much is a knot ? ” I asked, for I wished to do 
some mental arithmetic with miles as a basis. 

“ Six thousand and eighty feet,” responded Stimson 
promptly. “ The one-sixtieth part of a mean degree of 
a meridian.” 

“ More than a mile,” I said, multiplying yards by 
rods and getting all mixed up. 

“ A mile has 5,280 feet, so a knot or nautical mile is 
1.1515 land miles. Six knots an hour is nearly seven 
miles an hour, or 168 miles a day. There is your basis 
for figuring just when we’ll land on the Galapagos is- 
lands,” and Stimson smiled good-naturedly, for he 
knew that I was already wearied enough of a sailor’s 
life. 

I took the first watch at the steering oar and 
Stimson went to sleep in the canvas cabin after 
instructing me to call him in any one of many 
contingencies, chief of which was an increase in the 
wind. There was little for me to do, the rudder being 
lashed and the wind steady, so I sat on the bulwark 
beside the oar and watched the stars. Now and then a 
larger wave trailing us would break over the stern and 
push up to the bulwark, but only a few small stream- 
lets of water would creep beyond, puddling across the 
deck and under our cabin tent. 

At eleven o’clock, six bells, I was relieved Jty 
Stimson who awoke on the minute, as though he had 
63 


Castaway Island 

timed his sleep. He looked at the compass, held up a 
wet finger to measure the breeze, shifted the oar a 
trifle, then sent me to bed. The cabin by now was 
rather too wet for comfort, spray and the breaking 
waves having dampened blankets and the canvas 
beneath, and they held a chill that made me toss rest- 
lessly between sleep and waking. I could hear the 
captain moving about the deck as he tested ropes and 
stays, then heard him give a sharp exclamation, “ By 
jiminetty ! ” 

“ What is it?” I cried, throwing the blanket aside 
and poking my head out of the cabin. 

“ Look here, Bob,” he replied, speaking low. 
st What do you make of that? ” 

I was beside him in a moment, and my eyes followed 
the line of his pointing arm. The sky and the sea 
were of that deep, indigo blue of a moonless night, 
merging one into the other without break, sea and sky 
darkening evenly as they joined ; and away off* to the 
south, either in the sky or on the sea, so close it was to 
the horizon, flamed a great white light like a monster 
star. 

“ What is it? ” I asked, and a feeling of awe and the 
mystery of the sea made me whisper the question. 

“ You may have as many questions as you please,” 
Stimson answered, and though he spoke lightly I could 
feel he held a fear not caused by the peril of our po- 
sition, the dread of that which one sees but cannot 
understand. “ I don’t know, Bob. Is it star of the 
64 


“It Is Land” 

sky or light on the sea? Which does it seem to 
you?” 

I did not answer, watching the brightness of that 
spot of white. There was no flame, no flicker, no 
twinkle. If it was star, it was the largest star in ail 
the heavens, many times. At first I thought it had 
motion toward the east but when I established its po- 
sition by a low, fixed star, I found that I had been 
mistaken by the progress of the raft. The white light 
was motionless unless it was coming toward us, di- 
rectly at us. This was possible, for to my tired eyes it 
grew bigger the longer I stared at it. 

“Is it coming this way?” I asked, turning to 
Stimson. 

“ No, I think it is standing still. If it were anyway 
possible, I’d call it a lighthouse. It cannot be more 
than twenty miles away if it is on the sea.” 

“ Might it be a ship on fire? ” 

“ No ; too white and too steady. Not a sign of 
flame.” 

“ If it were on the water would we not see some 
reflection ? ” 

“ Not at this distance. We are too low in the water 
to get a distant horizon, so there would be no reflection 
even if it were much less than a score of miles away. 
But I’m not sure that it is not some comet or big star.” 

We watched it for hours, and it never varied, a white 
ball of fire, blue white, almost on a level with our eyes. 
At times we believed it must be star or comet, and 

65 


Castaway Island 

again we decided that it was the search-light of some 
steamer or cruiser. Then, suddenly, it disappeared 
while our eyes were upon it — went out. Where it had 
been, it was not. I blinked, thinking I had closed my 
tired eyes, but it was gone. 

“ Jiminetty ! ” gasped Stimson. “ That’s just how it 
came ! ” 

“ Gone in a jiffy ! ” I said, grasping his arm. 

He laughed. “ Show’s all over, Bob. To bed with 
you,” and he pointed at the tent. I crawled back into 
the damp blankets and finally went to sleep. 

I did not keep my second watch. Stimson let me 
sleep until seven o’clock, and my first question was of 
the light. It had not returned. In the broad daylight 
I stared long at the place where it had seemed to be, 
but there was nothing in sea or sky to account for the 
phenomenon. 

Unlike the preceding morning, the wind still held 
with the sun’s coming, if anything freshening a bit as 
the morning passed, and we had to forego our plunge. 
I prepared breakfast and soon afterward the captain 
went to sleep. It was a wet day, spray flying from the 
tops of the waves, soaking us through and through and 
making our low deck a damp, sloppy and slippery place. 
When Stimson awoke at noon, he went carefully over 
every rope, lashing and fastening on the raft. 

“ It’s a marvel how well she stands it,” he com- 
mented admiringly. “ This is a racking strain for any 
small craft, let alone a home constructed raft, but, Bob, 
66 


“It Is Land” 


the ‘ Cozy Cask ' is as tight as when she was launched. 
What do you say to more canvas ? ” 

I was willing so long as Stimson thought she could 
carry more, so we hoisted the mainsail again and felt 
the added motion in the increased racking and wetness 
of decks. The “ Cozy Cask ” was not a comfortable craft 
that day, what with water sweeping it from square stern 
to square bow, and we were wet to our knees with the 
spume, but the journey was being shortened by a knot 
or two an hour additional speed, and neither of us com- 
plained of the damp. The raft rolled, too, in a way 
that would have made any one addicted to seasickness 
extremely ill, but Stimson and I were immune, and the 
afternoon hours passed slowly away with cold meals 
and wet quarters. 

With the closing in of night we looked eagerly for 
the white light, but it was not to be found. “ We have 
passed it if it was of the sea,” said the captain, “ and it 
has passed us if it was of the heavens. I'm thinking 
it will be always one of those unexplained mysteries 
of the great oceans, like St. Elmo's lights and the 
‘ Flying Dutchman.' ” 

“ There never was a ‘ Flying Dutchman,' ” I said posi- 
tively, “ and there certainly was a blue-white flame out 
there last night.” 

“ You may be right, though the ‘ Flying Dutchman ' 
has a great many disciples among seagoing folk,” Stim- 
son remarked. “It is a thing like that of last night 
that makes the phantom ship a believable proposi- 
67 


Castaway Island 

tion to the ignorant sailor. What they cannot under- 
stand and explain by known laws are ascribed to the 
supernatural, and I don’t know as we can blame them, 
seeing what we have seen.” 

“ But you do not think that light was unexplainable 
or supernatural ? ” I asked. 

“ Supernatural, no ; unexplainable to you and me, 
yes, though that is not saying there is not a perfectly 
reasonable explanation for it somewhere else. It 
stumps me and it stumps you, yet maybe it is as simple 
as A, B, C.” 

All day we had been wet but without the discomfort 
of cold, for the sun had been tropical ; now the spray 
cut in with the sting of chill, and there was no use try- 
ing to sleep. All night we sat close together at the 
stern beside the steering oar, each with a line about his 
waist firmly lashed to the deck spars, a necessary pre- 
caution against the racing waves that covered the raft 
and forced us to cling to each other. Slowly the night 
passed, each hour many times its normal length. Stim- 
son endeavored to shorten them by tales of the sea, but 
conversation was difficult and interruptions frequent 
and serious. 

Morning came at last, the sun popping up out of the 
sea without the preliminary of daybreak and dawn 
which I was used to in northern latitudes. Again the 
captain made a thorough examination of the raft, 
tightening and strengthening and repairing, anxious 
but confident. The “Cozy Cask” had suffered a severe 
68 


“It Is Land” 


test as had, too, the “ Cozy Cask's ” crew, but both raft 
and crew had stood the strain, and now the warm rays 
of the sun, drying out both, giving cheer for chill, 
made us forget the horrors of the night. 

While we ate breakfast, repeating the monotony of 
biscuits and jam, Stimson computed the day’s run, esti- 
mating our speed and drift, and announced the result 
in encouraging manner. “ Getting close, close, Bobbin 
lad I ” he shouted. “ ’Most any time now you’ll be see- 
ing dry land pop up from the waves. A sharp lookout 
for’d is the order of the day.” 

We took turn about at the mast with the binoculars, 
scanning the horizon to west and north, and trying to 
sleep between duckings in the little tent. It was 
snatching cat-naps, for the wind was squally and unre- 
liable, and just as soon as I closed eyes in sleep the crest 
of some high wave would wash over me and fill my 
mouth with briny water. Fortunately the sun was hot 
and made wet clothing endurable, and we were too 
happy over our expected release from voyaging to mur- 
mur at the discomforts. On watch, I took advantage 
of those moments when the raft was at the summit of 
the wave to sweep the roughly uneven horizon with the 
glasses, hunting for something besides green, white- 
capped billows. 

It was Stimson, early in the afternoon, who first 
sighted land, and his cry of “ Land ho, Bob !” drove all 
thought of sleep away from me. In a second, I was 
beside him at the mast, searching with the glass for 
69 


Castaway Island 

what he had seen, following with each rise of the raft 
his pointing finger. 

“ A little more north,” he directed. “ Looks like 
a blue cloud close to the horizon. It’s a mountain, 
Bob.” 

For a long time I could see nothing ; there was a mist 
on the glass and a mist in my eyes ; but I was perfectly 
willing to take my captain’s word for it, wiping my 
eyes secretly on my shirt sleeve behind the sail. He 
could see it now with the naked eye, and I was finally 
able to crowd back the tears of joy to make out a line 
of hills, or the pale blue summits of mountains, merg- 
ing at the bottoms into the haze of the horizon. 

“ Goodish tall mountains those,” cried Stimson, hap- 
pily, gazing long through the glasses. “ Our island has 
a summer resort appearance from this distance. Sea 
bathing, mountain climbing, delightful views of pic- 
turesque beauty, wonderful and realistic scenery. All 
the comforts of Newport with the delights of the 
Catskills.” 

“ It is land ! ” I cried. “ Any land seems good to me.” 

“ Hurrah for the Galapagos ! ” he shouted, slapping 
me many sound blows on the back that did me good ; 
and he waltzed me around the deck to a lively whistled 
tune, bumping me into the cargo and almost demolish- 
ing the cabin. If there were tears of joy in my eyes 
when we first saw land, there were hearty laughs from 
me now, and I joined lustily in the cheers we gave in 
greeting to the Galapagos. 

70 


“It Is Land” 


Then we settled to work. I took the steering oar 
and at the captain’s direction headed the raft directly 
for the distant mountains, while he began rigging up 
additional sails. It was no longer a question of whether 
our craft would stand more sail ; we had four hours of 
daylight before us, and we wanted to sleep ashore. 
After once seeing land, the raft was impossible as a 
shelter for another night, and our eyes shone as we 
watched the mountains grow higher and the range grow 
longer, as one peak after another came out of the gray 
to join on the farther end. We could even see patches 
of green on the lower hills, and Stimson called them 
forests. The late afternoon sun made deep purple 
shadows and rose pink high lights of the rocky coast 
that faced us as we chased toward it. 

“ Not going to make it before dark,” said Stimson 
finally, measuring the sun’s height with his hand. 
“ We can’t run into that rocky coast at night, either, so 
we might just as well make up our minds to it.” 

“ Oh, Captain,” I cried, “ let’s try.” I felt that I 
could not spend another night on the raft. 

“ No, Bob. I’d take a fair chance, for I hate this 
delay as much as you do, but there isn’t a fair chance. 
We’d wreck in sight of land, and all we’ve been through 
would be useless. We’ll keep away until morning — 
stand off far enough to be out of danger, and drift 
about until daylight.” 

It was a crushing disappointment, but I made my 
best effort to conceal it, knowing that Stimson was 
7 * 


Castaway Island 

right. We approached the shore to a distance of about 
three miles, then dropped sails within a tantalizing 
view of the island. It was not yet sundown, but there 
is no twilight worthy of the name in the tropics, and 
we could not expect more than an hour of light, so we 
prepared a good, warm dinner, the first cooked meal 
we had attempted since the wind came up. It was an 
acrobatic performance, with every tenth wave or so 
spilling over the deck, but we managed to boil coffee 
and fry pork, and we gazed hungrily at the shore as 
we ate hungrily of our meal. There were trees almost 
to the water's edge and behind them forest-clad moun- 
tains that became barren peaks at their summits. Also, 
between the stretch of sand that made a yellow line at 
the surf-fringed edge of the sea, there were many rocks, 
some poking their wet and shining heads above the 
sea, others indicated by the waves that broke into 
white foam above them. 

As the wind was almost parallel with the coast, there 
was little danger of our drifting too close in during the 
night unless there came a change in its direction, and 
we both stayed awake all night to see that this did not 
happen and to watch the dark shadows of the cliffs 
ashore. As we moved slowly by, the mountainous 
formation of the coast slowly changed to a less rugged 
and more pleasing aspect. While a white line of foam 
along the beach made us give up any idea of attempt- 
ing a night landing, stretches of meadows and woods 
showed dimly between the shore line and the rugged 
72 


“It Is Land” 

hills and we were sure that daylight would discover a 
safe harbor for us. 

Toward morning, in the darkest part of the night, 
we completely lost sight of shore, and a feeling of great 
fear came over me that we had passed the island and 
might never get back to it. Stimson reassured me by 
saying that it was impossible to have drifted far enough 
to pass beyond the long range of mountains visible at 
sunset, and he believed we were crossing some indenta- 
tion of the shore, a bay or, perhaps, the mouth of a 
river. In less than an hour we had proof of the 
correctness of this view, for the dark form of the land 
reappeared much nearer than before, and as we drifted 
on it kept closing in. 

“ It’s a point or spit running out into the sea,” said 
the captain beside the foremast, striving to make eye- 
sight more keen by the use of the glasses. “ I don’t 
like it at all,” he muttered ; then, briskly, “ Up sail, 
Bob ! We must beat out to sea.” 

“ What is it ? ” I asked anxiously, for I could hear 
the breaking of surf on rock ahead, and see a dark line 
indistinct in the night. 

“ A reef,” Stimson answered shortly, hauling at the 
hoist of the foresail. “ Take the oar, Bob, and throw 
her over to port just as far as this canvas will hold 
wind. We’ve a coral reef in front of us, and if the 
'Cozy Cask’ expects to take us ashore, she’ll have to do 
two points better sailing than she’s ever shown. Bring 
her into the wind, Bob ! ” 


73 


Castaway Island 

I swung the heavy oar about in long sweeps, thrust- 
ing the bow of the raft into the waves, while Stimson 
got both sails set, trimmed almost square with the 
deck. For a second they fluttered either way, then 
filled to throw the bows back again toward the reef. 

“ Hold her! Hold her, Bob ! ” shouted Stimson, 
jumping to my side and adding his strength to the 
oar. Slowly she came into the wind, Stimson nursing 
her off a point at a time until the sails were drawing 
fairly. “ She may do it,” he said finally, “ though she 
isn’t all one might ask for on a tack.” 

“ Can you see the end of the reef? ” I asked, for my 
eyes were blinded by salt spume. 

“ I think so — not sure, but there’s a break or an 
ending off thereaway. We can hold out till daylight 
gives us a helping hand, Bobbin, my boy.” 

The next half hour was an anxious time for us both. 
We were drifting closer all the time, though delayed 
by sail and rudder, and now the breaking of sea on 
rocks was plainly heard, a long hissing sound as the 
waves rushed in, a crashing and roar as they came 
back. We could see the white foam to our right get- 
ting nearer and more menacing each minute. It 
seemed now like shipwreck at the very end of our 
strange cruise, and Stimson shouted me the orders for 
preparation, raising his voice to be heard above the 
seething surf. 

“ Get a line about your waist,” he called, “ then tie 
it to me, tightly, too, and so it won’t slip. If we beach, 
74 


“It Is Land” 


go in with the wave as far as it will carry you and try 
not to come back with it. If you feel ground under 
your feet, clamp to it with your toes and clamp hard. 
I’ll be close behind you and holding the line. We’ll 
make it, lad — we’ll make it yet ! ” 

“ Ay, ay, sir,” I answered, trying to be brave, and I 
carried out orders while Stimson swept the great oar 
through the waves, sculling against the drift. Then 
the sun rose out of the sea, a great, glorious sun, giving 
us the light for which we had prayed ; and it showed 
us the waves washing clear across the coral spit on 
which we were rapidly being dashed. 


7 5 



CHAPTER VI 
THE ISLAND 

A HALF MILE of white, surging, boiling breakers, 
broken here and there by the red-brown tops of 
coral on which the waves dashed great masses of silver 
spume, so close against us that it was hopeless to think 
that we might hold the “ Cozy Cask ” off to round the 
distant point, and a morning sun shining merrily down 
upon it and shipwreck ; that was what faced us that first 
morning of the Galapagos. Bitterly we worked against 
the drift, sails, oars and spars, trying to force the raft 
away from the rocks, worn by the waters into many 
holes, like a huge sponge ; every effort was vain, for, 
try as we might, we could not hold our own, the wind, 
now dead against us, forcing us into the reef. 

Suddenly Stimson gave over his efforts, and with a 
cry to me which I could not make out for the noise of 
76 


The Island 


the sea, threw the raft’s head directly at the surf. I 
guessed what he was about to attempt and rushed to 
the mast, throwing the sail about to catch every breath 
of the wind. We were going over the bar I It was our 
only chance, barely that, but there was nothing else to 
be done. Stimson, leaning hard against the steering 
oar, looked straight ahead, a grim smile on his set face, 
and his eyes studied the reef before him with deep in- 
tensity. If the raft struck, it would be torn to pieces 
on the instant and our chances of holding to the sub- 
merged rocks were infinitesimal. 

With the speed of a swooping gull, we came on the 
long breaker, its surge about our knees. I held to the 
mast and looked ahead at the jagged coral rocks beyond 
the receding wave. Would our wave be great enough 
to carry us over? Would we land on those pointed 
spurs to be ground to pieces ? A second more and we 
were amid the white spray and above the reef. More 
than half-way over that billow carried us before it be- 
gan to recede, then came the scraping of barrels against 
rock, a crash and a great tearing. One side of the raft 
was thrown high in air, there was the rending of rope 
lashings, and the mast to which I held went over the 
bows. I went with it, swept forward, to be dragged 
back again by Stimson’s fierce pull at the line. For a 
long moment there was the grinding and breaking of 
casks torn by the rocks, then we began to lift again on 
a smooth sea. Like a miracle, the waves were robbed 
of their anger and the closely following billow, oily and 
77 


Castaway Island 

suave, caught us with steadying power, freeing us from 
the hold of the reef, lifting us over the rocks that 
reached for us. Lying sprawled on the deck where I 
had been jerked by Stimson’s pull at the line, I saw 
him press with all his strength, oar blade against rock, 
and the power of mighty muscles was in that heave. 
Our broken craft rose with the long, smooth wave, raced 
with it, catching the rocks now and then with jerks and 
bumps, lines snapping, splinters flying, and Stimson at 
the oar shoving her on and on. Over we went, scrap- 
ing, rasping, quivering, to drop into deep, quiet water 
beyond the spit. 

Stimson lifted me to my feet. “Hurt, Bob?” he 
asked anxiously, and I had to shake myself to find out. 
I was breathless and bruised by the beating of the 
waves, but I was still whole and without broken bones. 
“ Lucky as they make them ! ” declared the captain. 

“What did it — quieted the sea?” I gasped when I 
could speak. 

“ Olive oil — good old salad oil,” laughed Stimson. 
“ It was our one chance, and I took it. Those barrels 
held enough grease to smooth out a big bit of sea, so I 
smashed them on the rocks. We went over on olive 
oil, Robin lad, and we’re safe now with the hatches 
and most of the bulwarks.” 

We were still a half mile or more from the shore, but 
inside the reef it was as quiet as a duck pond, and the 
beach was free from breakers. Making land was merely 
the work of sculling the raft in and pulling l^er up the 
78 


The Island 


gently sloping beach, and exhausted as we both were, 
we made the extra effort joyfully and were soon ashore. 
The feel of solid ground beneath my feet was real 
happiness after days of staggering about on the tops of 
waves and our experience with the top of a reef. I 
kicked my heels in air and started at a run for the 
trees, green trees of heavy foliage and massive trunks, 
that came down nearly to the water’s edge, but was 
halted by a shout from the captain. “ Hold on there, 
Bob ! ” he cried. “ We will make that trip together. 
First take care of our cargo, then we’ll go exploring.” 

There had been a shrinkage in our cargo caused by 
the enforced passage over the coral spit. A case of bis- 
cuit was gone, some of the pots and pans and my kit, 
which I had forgotten to make fast the last time I had 
it open, but the rest was safe, though wet and soggy. 
We carried everything up above the tide line, opening 
it up to the sun and wind so it might dry. The ammu- 
nition had not been damaged at all, the powder being 
in a cask and the cartridges water-proof, but we wiped 
them all carefully and spent considerable time in dry- 
ing and cleaning the guns. All this was done before 
we broke fast on this first day in the Galapagos. 

Stimson gave a sigh of satisfaction as he finished 
cleaning his rifle and pushed a clip of cartridges into 
the magazine. “ Now, Bob, on to victory ! ” he cried 
merrily. “ First we want water — fresh water that isn’t 
flat and warm ; then a temporary camp and breakfast. 
Have you loaded the shotgun, Bob?” 

79 


Castaway Island 

I replied that it had small shot in both barrels and 
a percussion cap on either tube. “ Trade with me,” 
said the captain, handing me the rifle. “ I want to 
see what that spatter gun will do in the shooting line. 
We are apt to find small game.” 

“ There are birds in plenty,” I said. “ I’ve been 
hearing their calls ever since we landed.” 

“ So have I, and unless I am mistaken, I have heard 
the chattering of a band of hapales.” 

“ Hapales ? ” I asked. 

“ Monkeys — little monkeys or marmosets. Lots of 
them in these tropical parts of America, but they’re 
not proper game, although some folks eat them.” 

“ I couldn’t shoot a monkey, let alone eat it. It 
would seem like eating a friend,” I declared, following 
Stimson up the sloping beach to the edge of the forest. 
The songs of the birds had stilled as we approached 
the woods and the trees, growing close together, made 
a darkness beneath that was almost twilight. If I had 
been alone, I never would have entered their shadow 
and I was somehow frightened even with Stimson be- 
side me. He had no hesitancy in pushing aside the 
low-hanging branches and entering the wood and I 
followed in his wake with as much confidence as I 
could muster, still with a feeling of awe and eeriness 
that had come to me first the night of the white flame 
at sea, a mystery and dread of the unknown. 

We did not talk now. I imagined that the captain 
felt some of the same apprehension that held me silent 
80 


The Island 


in this unknown wood. Once or twice as we climbed 
up the knoll he looked back at me and smiled en- 
couragement, and I attempted to return it, but my face 
muscles were stiff. 

Our footsteps breaking through the underbrush was 
the only sound in the forest where a few minutes be- 
fore had been numerous bird calls and flutings, and I 
had the impression of thousands of eyes watching us 
from the concealment of the foliage. Birds and beasts 
had ceased their chatter to follow with suspicious eyes 
these two new animals who had intruded upon their 
sanctuary. Though I could see nothing alive, hear no 
sound of motion, I was certain we were under espio- 
nage of many bright eyes. 

“ Bob,” said Stimson, looking back, and I am sure 
I jumped. “Listen! Isn't that the rippling of 
water ? ” 

I heard it at once, a distant murmur of running 
water, far away but unmistakable. “ There is a creek 
down there somewhere,” I said, pointing. 

“ The only thing alive in all these woods. What has 
become of the birds ? ” he asked. 

“ They are watching us. I can feel them watching 
us.” 

Stimson laughed. “ We must be queer animals to 
them. They may never have seen a human before or 
heard the sound of a man's voice.” 

“ Suppose I wake them up with the gun ? ” I sug- 
gested, ready to dissipate the silence by any means. 

Si 


Castaway Island 

“ Don’t, Bob. Let them get used to us gradually, 
learn that we are friends, not enemies. We may have 
to kill a few for food, but never wantonly and never 
near our camp. We want the birds about us, and we 
want them singing.” 

I took the reproof meekly enough, for I had no de- 
sire in me for slaughter of bird or beast, and we fol- 
lowed the sound of the tinkling water down the hill a 
few hundred yards, coming out on a little flat where 
the large forest trees were replaced by palms and an 
underbrush of some blue berries. Along one side of 
this flat ran a brook, not wide nor deep, but its water 
was cold and sweet and we drank thirstily of the first 
fresh water that had passed our lips since we left 
Guayaquil. Beyond the stream, the hill ran up ab- 
ruptly, an almost perpendicular bluff at the place 
where we had struck it, its top covered with trees. 

We had brought biscuit, pork and coffee with us, 
a pot and skillet for the cooking, and we decided to 
breakfast beside the stream, hunting a place less choked 
by the berry vines, the fruit of which I had already 
tasted and hastily rejected because of its bitterness. 
The captain went up the stream and I took the down- 
stream way, not intending to wander any distance or 
out of call of each other. The stream made a sharp 
decline, and I was obliged to descend several small 
bluffs to follow it, but within a few rods I found what 
I believed would be an ideal camp-ground. At the 
base of one of these little precipices, where the stream 
82 


The Island 


made a waterfall dropping its waters into a deep and 
rocky pool, there was a little glade covered with 
smooth turf. Around its shoreward side was the 
fringing forest, and back of the brook was high cliff, 
and all was shaded, cool and harmonious. I let out a 
great halloo to notify Stimson of my success. 

That shout came back to me a hundred times, echoes 
from the near-by rocks, then from the farther moun- 
tains, some so strong and clear that they seemed noth- 
ing else possible but an answering call. I sat down 
hurriedly, frightened, looking back and around to see 
if some one was not calling, although I knew they 
were echoes. Before the reverberations died away, the 
forest that had been so still since we entered it be- 
came a babel of bird notes and animal cries. I heard 
the flapping of wings of the frightened flight of flocks 
of birds, the chattering and scampering through 
branches of bands of monkeys. With eyes staring 
wide and ears strained to hear each sound I waited 
for Stimson’s answering call. 

It did not come. The wood quieted again, slowly, 
mysteriously became silent. As though its hundreds 
of denizens were holding their breaths to watch me, 
themselves deep hidden, the forest shades loomed with 
stealthy furtive observers. I dared not call again, 
arouse the echoes and the woods. I waited, nervous 
and frightened. 

“ Bang ! ” came the report of a gun, then a second 
shot, and the forest again became alive with startled 

83 


Castaway Island 

cries and swift flight. I jumped to my feet, rifle in 
hand, looking for something definite to attack me, some- 
thing I might identify as a foe or antagonist, but there 
was nothing in view. If a panther had sprung out at 
me, a jaguar crouched to attack, I believe I should have 
known what to do and had the nerve to aim and pull 
trigger, but with nothing visible to cause me fear, I 
was panic stricken. 

I ran. I scrambled up the bluff by the waterfall and 
stumbled along over rocks and logs as though I was 
being chased by all the bogies in Bogieland ! I heard 
Stimson call, “ Ahoy, Bob ! ” but I could not find voice 
to answer, running on to meet him in panic. He swung 
out of the brush almost into my arms, and he grasped 
me as though I were running away, not to him. “ What 
is it? What is it, Bob?” he cried anxiously, shaking 
me. “ What has happened ? ” 

“ Nothing,” I gasped, trying to catch my breath. 

“ But you are hurt — scared ? Which is it ? ” 

“ Scared, that’s all,” I answered, already ashamed of 
my fright. “ It was the echoes and the noises of the 
woods. Let’s get out of here, back to the shore.” 

Stimson set the butt of his gun on the ground and 
looked me over. There was an expression of mingled 
anxiety and amusement on his face, but he did not 
laugh. “ I shouldn’t have left you alone, lad,” he said 
finally. “ It’s the lonesomeness did it; but forget it 
now. I’ve found our breakfast and a place for our camp. 
Come along, and food will fix your nerves all right” 

84 


The Island 


He had two large birds, magnificent of plumage, 
which he said were guans, a species of pheasant much 
more beautiful than those I had known in the north. 
Saying nothing of my discovery of a camping place, for 
the spot was loathsome to me, I followed him up-stream 
to where, a quarter of a mile above the place we had 
first struck the stream, there was an opening in the 
brush, an almost circular area of a half acre extent, the 
stream skirting its farther side. To me it did not seem 
so well adapted as the spot I had found, for it was ex- 
posed and unshaded, but it was certainly more cheerful 
with the sun shining down brightly upon it. Only 
along the stream were there any trees to serve as shade. 

I made a fire while Stimson prepared the birds for 
cooking, and we were soon whiffing the pleasant aroma 
of broiling guans. With coffee and biscuit we had as 
fine a breakfast as any one could wish, and during it I 
confessed to the captain all my fright and told him of 
the fine place I had found for a camp. He decided 
against my place for the same reasons I had argued for 
it. “ A great many people,” he said, “ are deluded by 
the belief that a camp should be under shady trees or 
beside a bluff that cuts off the sun in the tropics, but it 
is a mistake never made by an army man. The more 
sun that shines in the camp the better, even if you have 
to go away from your camp to keep cool, for the sun is 
the greatest killer of germs that there is. I'd rather 
face twenty tiger-cats, or thereabouts, than have some 
of these South American microbes get into my system. 
85 


Castaway Island 

I’m not half as afraid of our camp being attacked by 
wild animals as I am of fever germs creeping in, so 
we’ll let your sheltered spot remain cool and shaded 
and lonesome, Bob.” 

We spent all the afternoon bringing up our supplies 
from the beach making six trips each way over the hill. 
It was not light work, but I was pleased to find that I was 
hardening to work and could do my share of it, not so 
much as Stimson, who seemed absolutely indefatigable, 
but a good bit without tiring too much. We first built a 
V-tent with one of the larger pieces of sail-cloth stretched 
over a pole atop of two posts, pegging it to the ground 
at its lower edges, and under this cover we piled our 
supplies, leaving room in the center for our beds. It 
was a crude shelter, but sufficient for our present needs, 
for the nights were clear and warm and there was little 
dew fall. 

We finished our labors just before sundown and made 
dinner from the remains of the pheasants, warmed over 
with strips of salt pork. Then Stimson built up a big 
camp-fire before one end of the tent, not for heat but 
the companionship of the blaze, and we stretched out 
on our blankets. Night and the silence settled over us ; 
the edge of the forest became a black fringe ; the brook 
sang and whispered in undertones ; the stars peered 
down into our little clearing ; and Stimson and I for- 
got wild beasts, germs and microbes in the solid sleep 
of fatigue from hard toil. 


86 





CHAPTER VII 
WE FIND WILD CHICKENS 
CHATTERING among the branches at the edge 



-A*- of the forest awoke me next morning just as the 
sun was coming up above the trees. I knew that it 
must be the marmosets which we had frightened away 
the day before, and I poked my head out of the front 
of the tent, hoping to catch sight of them. That they 
were watching our camp was evident, for before I could 
locate them they had seen me and were making off, 
jumping and chattering, through the trees. 

Stimson was still sleeping heavily, and as I knew he 
needed sleep I did not wake him, but laid a fire and 
t went to the stream for water, intending to have break- 
fast all ready when he awoke. Our tent was not more 
than twenty yards from the brook, but there was a 
bank to the stream which ran down abruptly to the 


Castaway Island 

water’s edge. I had come to the margin of this and 
was prepared to scramble down when I saw something 
that stopped me so abruptly that one foot stuck out 
over the ledge. 

Below me, lying at length on a gray rock above the 
stream, was an animal that I thought was a tiger, so 
bright were its colors, yellow and black, and so strong 
it seemed as it stretched there, muscles poised. It 
had not heard me, for it was looking into the water, its 
head thrust out beyond the rock, and it was absorbed 
in the occupation of fishing. A swift stroke downward 
of its forepaw, a splash and the glittering of water 
thrown high in air, and the big cat jumped backward 
to grasp the fish it had so adeptly jerked out of its 
element. As it leaped, I turned and rushed for the 
tent and the rifle, at the same time calling to Stim- 
son who, with shotgun in hand, broke from the 
shelter. 

“What is it?” he cried as I passed him, plunging 
into the tent for the rifle which lay upon my blankets. 

“ Tiger ! ” I answered, and I saw a smile cross his 
face as he ran by me for the stream. 

I joined him there a moment later, and pointed out 
the place where the big cat had lain. Then we hunted 
up stream and down, the captain keeping close beside 
me, but the beast had made its escape. “ It certainly 
could not be a tiger,” said Stimson, when I had told 
him all about it. “ Tigers are not found in America, 
and there is no animal on these continents that will 
88 


We Find Wild Chickens 


compare in size with the Asian tiger. How big was 
your fisherman ? ” 

“ It lay there on that rock with its head beyond its 
farther edge and its tail was hanging a foot or more 
over this side.” 

“ About four feet,” remarked the captain, measuring 
with his eye. “ Not much of a figure for a tiger, Bob.” 

“ But it was marked like a tiger, yellowish with 
black rings around it, and it stretched out just as I 
have seen tigers in the circus. It waved the end of its 
tail, too.” 

“ It belongs to the cat tribe, all right, and if I am 
not mistaken it was the clouded ocelot that you dis- 
turbed at its sport. It's a fierce little fighter, but 
nothing that we need fear, I am glad to say. I’d think 
different if it was a jaguar, but you wouldn’t mistake a 
jaguar for a tiger. For a leopard you might, for it has 
black spots like a leopard and is even more ferocious 
than its old world cousin. But your fishing friend 
won’t worry us. In fact, it has done us a good turn, 
for it has taught us that there are fish to be had in the 
stream, and fish are fine breakfast food. Let’s follow 
the ocelot’s example.” 

“ Lie on the rock and jerk fish out with our hands ? ” 

Stimson laughed. “ No, I’m afraid that we should 
have to postpone breakfast until supper time if we 
tried it that way. We will see what a fish-line will 
do.” 

I did not tell him that we had no lines or hooks 
89 


Castaway Island 

because I had already begun to realize that the captain 
had a way of knowing what he was about when he 
made a suggestion. I followed him back to the tent 
and watched him take a strand of heavy linen thread 
from the spool. It was not strong enough to hold a 
fish of any size, but he set me at work at one end of it, 
he at the other, twisting in opposite directions. Finalty, 
when it began to get kinky, he brought his end of the 
thirty foot line and ran his hand down between the 
two strands to keep them even, and let the twist wrap 
them into a single line of double strength. It was 
made in a few moments and it was strong enough for 
almost any kind of brook fish. 

The hook was the simplest hook made — a bent pin. 
“ It’s primitive, but it will serve until I make better 
ones. I’ll need a blow-pipe for that, and the blow-pipe 
will have to be made first. Then I can take temper 
out of needles, shape them into hooks and retemper 
them again. But we will see what the small boy’s 
bent pin and a grub for bait will do to the inhabitants 
of the creek. Cut a rod and make a try for our break- 
fast, Bob.” 

I fixed my tackle and went to the stream, this time 
carrying the rifle, as I did not know whether the ocelot 
would be back at its rock. As it was not, I usurped 
its position of vantage and cast my bait into a deep hole 
down-stream. It had not more than touched the water 
when I had a bite and gave a quick and excited jerk. 
The line came out of water, and so did the bent pin, 
90 


We Find Wild Chickens 


but it was no longer bent in the shape of a hook. It 
had been straightened by my impulsive jerk. 

I repaired damages, found another grub, rebaited 
and decided to take it more easily next time. Next 
time was immediately after casting, for my bait had no 
time to sink below the surface when it was seized by a 
hungry fish. I struck gently and was pleased to find 
that the fish was still attached when I began pulling 
in. It was a gamy little fish, and fought hard for a 
moment or two, but I let it tire itself before I lifted it 
from the water with a quick jerk that threw it behind 
me in the grass. For half an hour I caught fish, and 
lost fish that were too strong for my hook. The little 
ones I could land easily enough, but every time I 
struck a big one — and there were plenty of big ones, — 
the pin would bend and the fish would have my bait 
at the expense of a pricked mouth. 

Stimson came down and carried away the catch, and 
soon called to me to desist catching for the pleasure of 
eating. It was nine o'clock by the chronometer and I 
was hungry enough to appreciate the first really civi- 
lized meal we had enjoyed in all the time we were 
sailors or castaways. There were hot cakes with jam 
in lieu of syrup, fried fish and salt pork, and coffee 
with sugar. It was a wonderful breakfast, and we ate 
it with appetite. 

That our island was thickly populated by birds was 
evident to us while we were eating. Their first fright 
over, the newness of these new occupants of their little 
9i 


Castaway Island 

glade gone, they began flying to and from the trees 
along the stream in great numbers and the varieties 
were so many that it was impossible to keep track of 
them all. “ That is a paroquet,” Stimson would say, 
pointing to a gorgeously colored green and yellow 
flyer ; or, “ There goes an ant-thrush,” as a bird of 
long legs and short tail flew bj'. There were grass- 
finches, greenlets, doves of many kinds, a bright red 
flamingo, and a beautiful bird with long tail which the 
captain called a tyrant-bird. Then there were many 
small birds which Stimson did not know at all and had 
never seen before in his varied travels. I discovered 
the most remarkable of all these fowls, according to 
the captain, and it was a hen. Just a plain, ordinary, 
back-yard hen ! It was walking at the edge of the 
wood scratching in the dirt as though it was hunting 
for worms in its own chicken yard. I called the cap- 
tain’s attention to it, and his surprise was more than 
mine had been at any of the marvelous birds that he 
had pointed out. 

“A chicken?” he cried. “Here? What can this 
mean ? A hen is not a wild bird. We have run into 
somebody’s poultry yard. There must be people here- 
abouts,” and he hurriedly made for the fowl. The hen 
saw him coming and gave a cry that I never heard in 
a chicken coop in my life. There was an immediate 
rustling in the woods, the swift beating of wings, and 
my hen rose in easy flight and disappeared among the 
trees. It flew as the grouse flies or as a prairie chicken 
92 


We Find Wild Chickens 


will get up from the ground, with swift, short strokes 
of the wings. 

“ They are wild,” said Stimson, returning to his 
breakfast. “ Wild chickens ! It is the first time I 
ever heard of wild chickens — just plain, garden variety 
poultry ! What do you think of this for an island, 
Bob? Furnishes us with fowls and hens’ eggs. Soft- 
boiled eggs for breakfast to-morrow, Robin ! ” 

“ But there are wild chickens, aren’t there? ” 

“ You have seen the first that I ever heard of. That 
chicken is the direct lineal descendant of somebody's 
tame barn-yard Cochin egg producer. That bird, Bob- 
bin, might have come from an incubator so far as looks 
are concerned.” 

“ Then you believe there are people on this island ? ” 
Stimson thought for a long while before he answered 
that question. “ There may be; certainly there’ have 
been,” he replied at last. “ Either that fowl that we 
saw and the others which we heard are domesticated 
chickens gone wild, or they are the descendants of the 
poultry yard. I wonder what other queer things this 
island has in store for us.” 

The hapales were the next queer thing that the 
island held for me, although they were familiar ani- 
mals to Stimson. A band of these little monkeys, 
probably the same I had heard in the morning, came 
and sat in the trees at the edge of the wood and talked 
us over among themselves. They were very timid, and 
would rush chattering into the interior of the woods 
93 


Castaway Island 

on the smallest provocation, but were so inquisitive 
that a few moments would find them back again. We 
watched them for a long time until the captain called 
attention to the passing of time. “ There is lots to 
be done / 7 he explained. “We are shipwrecked on a- 
desert island, even if there are chickens and fresh eggs 
upon it. We must get up a signal of distress for pass- 
ing ships to see, we must have the night flare made 
and ready to light, and we must take a general survey 
of the island. But first we had better go down to the 
raft and see that it is safe and above water. We may 
need that raft again. Come on, Bob.” 

We set off through the woods in the same order as 
the day before, Stimson with the shotgun in front, I 
following with the rifle. As we were not anxious to 
kill any game, we continued our conversation, and 
Stimson told me a great deal of the ways of wild ani- 
mals. “There is only one thing we need have fear of 
on the island, I imagine,” he said, “ and that is snakes. 
All beasts of prey are timid of man and not only anx- 
ious to keep away from him, but able to do so. They 
are so keen of scent and eye that they can conceal 
themselves before we even know they are around and 
it is seldom you will run upon an animal so absorbed 
as was that ocelot this morning. Any beast that we 
find on the island is apt to leave us decidedly alone 
unless we begin the fuss. You wound a jaguar or tiger- 
cat or corner him and he will fight, and you'd better 
look out or you will get hurt. Leave him alone and 
94 


We Find Wild Chickens 



95 


Castaway Island 

he will leave you alone. Bat snakes are different. 
They don’t seem to care to get away usually, or if they 
do want to, they bite first and get away afterward. So 
keep your eyes wide open for the reptiles every minute, 
Bob. If you are bitten and I am not close around to 
take care of you, slash the bite with your knife so it 
will bleed good and plenty, tie your handkerchief above 
the bite if it is where you can, twisting it against the 
flesh with a stick for a tourniquet, and hike for camp. 
I’m going to keep an eye out for the maguey, which 
ought to grow here. In Mexico they call it the rattle- 
snake master, and the sap from it I know is a mighty 
good antidote for snake poison. But don’t get bitten — 
that’s the best remedy.” 

I kept my eyes on the ground, looking for snakes all 
the way to the beach, and on my excursions for a good 
many days afterward. 

We found the raft as we had left it on the sands and 
we pulled it still farther up on the beach. As I turned 
away from it, I noticed something dark a long way 
down the beach toward the spit, bobbing up and down 
in the surf. I pointed it out to Stimson. “ What is 
that ? ” I asked. 

“ One of our casks, by jiminetty ! And we may 
need it, Bob. Come on and we’ll bring it ashore.” 

We rescued the cask and found another among the 
rocks at the end of the reef and a third farther along 
the shore. One was badly demolished, but Stimson 
said he could repair it, and with these we might make 
96 


We Find Wild Chickens 


the raft almost as good as new. Then we walked along 
the beach, going as the compass showed us, in a general 
easterly direction. We had evidently been cast ashore 
on the north coast of this island, and we were now 
rounding that deep indentation that had caused me to 
think we had passed the land on the last night on the 
raft. It curved to the south and east in a long line of 
sand-dunes, small hills blown up from the beach by 
the winds. 

When we had come to the most southerly part of the 
curve we found that here was the mouth of a small 
river which Stimson supposed to be our stream. If so 
it had grown in size, for it was more than fifty feet wide 
where it came out of the woods through a narrow defile 
and spread itself over the beach sands. On beyond the 
river the woods ceased, and there were high bluffs that 
came close to the sea, and behind these bluffs were 
mountains. The mouth of the river was about five 
miles from where we had landed the raft. 

We decided to explore up the river and did make a 
start, but before we had gone a half mile gave it up. 
It was getting late in the afternoon and the traveling 
was too rough. The forest was almost impenetrable 
and we were obliged to wade much of the way. Some- 
times we were in water up to our waists. So we turned 
back, the captain explaining that our defeat was only 
a temporary setback and we would try it again with 
more daylight before us. “ We had better come down- 
stream from our camp/' he suggested. “ I am confi- 
97 


Castaway Island 

dent that this is our brook and that it swings around 
the base of that spur there. Another creek must branch 
in somewhere below our camp and that adds the water 
to make up this river. We’ll see for ourselves though, 
some day soon.” 

We were so long making down the creek that we 
soon found that it would be dark before we could reach 
camp. We hurried along the beach as rapidly as we 
could but the sun had sunk before we reached the raft 
and our trip through the wood was made in the dark- 
ness of night, I holding on to the captain’s belt. How 
he guided himself I do not know, but we finally saw a 
lightening through the trees and came out in our open- 
ing with the stars shining above and our tent showing 
a white spot in the middle. As we approached it, I saw 
a figure glide from it and then another and the silence 
was broken by a great howl. Stimson broke into a run. 
“ Come on, Bob ! The monkeys have captured us,” he 
shouted and dashed into the tent. It was a wreck. 
When we had lighted a torch and could see the damage 
done we were appalled. Flour, coffee and sugar were 
scattered and tramped into the ground. Our pans and 
kettles had been bent and mangled. Stimson’s kit had 
been opened and most of his clothing torn into shreds. 
Everything was topsy-turvy, a mess that was sickening 
to us who had preserved with so much care and through 
such vicissitudes these important requirements of life 
and comfort on the island. 

“Serves me just right,” said Stimson gloomily, cast- 
98 


We Find Wild Chickens 

ing the light of his torch over the wreck. “ I knew 
there were howler monkeys in these parts, and I knew 
what mischief they will do if given the chance. I in- 
vited them in by leaving things where they could get 
at ’em. Well, Bob, thanks to me, we are going with- 
out coffee and sugar hereafter and bread and flapjacks 
are a thing of the past.” 

“ Not quite so bad as that, Captain,” I replied. 
“ Here is half the sack of flour and part of the coffee 
left. We’ll be able to pull quite a bit out of this mess 
when we can see to get at it. Let’s have supper now, 
anyhow.” 

“ Good boy, Bobbin ! That’s the spirit ! I see you 
have nerve, all right. It’s a pretty hard knock, but 
there’s no use crying over spilled milk — or spilled 
flour and coffee. Build a fire and I will mix up some 
batter cakes out of the remains, and to-morrow we will 
hunt a substitute for flour. There should be bread- 
fruit on this island ; breadfruit, plaintains and pine- 
apples. Ever eat a breadfruit, Bob? ” 

I had not or ever seen one, but I was confident that 
the island could take care of all our needs. We had 
found fish, game and chickens ; there were fresh laid 
eggs in the woods ; and my faith in the producing 
qualities of the Galapagos was becoming unlimited. 
Our sugar was gone ; we would find sugar. When the 
coffee gave out, we would discover a coffee plantation. 
When our clothes wore away we would find woolen 
mills, cotton gins, or at least substitutes for these 
99 


Castaway Island 

clothes-producing factories. The island was an in- 
exhaustible mine of the necessities and superfluities 
of life, so I thought, and I had no worries of the 
morrow. 


/ 


ioo 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE GREAT WHITE LIGHT 

T HE salving of the wrecked provisions was our first 
care in the morning, and we gathered from the 
ground all the coffee and so much of the sugar and 
flour as was not mixed with the dirt. I washed the 
coffee carefully in the stream, placing it in the sun to 
dry, for it might serve us when the balance of the 
supply was exhausted ; but most of the sugar and flour 
was a total loss. 

“ We will build a cache, so that we will not suffer 
this way again,” said Stimson, who still blamed him- 
self for the negligence that allowed the monkeys ac- 
cess to our stores. “ A dug-out, such as is used by the 
ranchers in the west States, will be easy of construction 
and should be animal proof. Ever handle a pickaxe, 
Bob?” 


IOI 


Castaway Island 

I had not, but I was willing to learn ; so I shoul- 
dered the pick, while the captain took the axe and 
shovel, and we went up-stream to where the bank of 
the creek rose abruptly. Here, Stimson said, was the 
proper slope of ground for our dug-out, and he laid out 
a rectangle, eight by twelve feet, one narrow end facing 
the stream and about three feet above it ; the opposite 
end being at least twelve feet above the water. This 
we gradually leveled, cutting into the hill from its 
lower end, piling the dirt taken from the hole on the 
bank beside it. So that, when completed, we had three 
walls of a level floored room back and sides, all six feet 
high. 

It was hard work and a warm day ; but each day I 
was growing more used to hard work and the hot sun, 
my muscles were hardening and my wind improving. 
I stuck to the task until noon, when we had completed 
more than half the cut and Stimson insisted on knock- 
ing off for lunch and a rest. I was glad enough of the 
chance to relieve my tired arms and aching back, and 
went with him to camp, where we ate a hearty meal 
and stretched out in the cool shade of the trees. “ We 
will have a dam in the stream at some place where we 
can hold back water sufficient for a swimming pool,” 
suggested Stimson, as we lay at our ease. “ We may 
just as well have conveniences, and a bath right now 
would be an attraction to this summer resort. How- 
ever, the necessaries first. Let’s back to our work,” 
and he led the way to our cellar storehouse. 

102 


The Great White Light 

“ While you are finishing the excavation, I will cut 
poles for a front wall and the roof. We will have it 
done by evening,” the captain said. “ The rest of the 
work, after the cut is made, is easy. We will roof on 
the slant and finish above with a covering of dirt, so 
that it will shed water. The front will be of logs, with 
a door of poles, hinged and pegged with wood. No 
monkeys need apply, eh, Bob?” 

It was nearly dark when the pole door was finally 
closed on our completed cellar with the provisions 
saved from the “ Sally B ” inside. I was too tired to 
care for supper and made but a pretense of eating the 
meal which the captain cooked. No sooner was it 
over than I went off into slumber, and for the first 
time since I was a very small boy, walked in my sleep. 

I remember that when I was five or six years old, 
mother had lots of trouble with my sleep-walking pro- 
pensities, and many a fright had I given her by my 
agility in climbing to dangerous places in my dreams. 
But this habit I had seemingly outgrown. The strain 
of the day’s unusually tiring exertions must have 
brought a recurrence of the disease, — I suppose it is a 
disease — for some time late that night when Stimson, 
too, was soundly sleeping, I crept quietly from my 
blanket, out of the open tent, up the creek to the new 
dug-out, and there started right up the side of the steep 
hill. And all the time I was sleeping so soundly that 
I do not even remember what I was dreaming. 

It must have been some time after my leaving the 
103 


Castaway Island 

camp that the captain, awaking by chance, discov- 
ered my absence. He was frightened, of course, and 
calling out to me without answer, began a search. He 
never thought of my walking while asleep, and when 
he had called to me all around the little opening with- 
out getting a reply, he decided that something or other 
had stolen me. He lit a big fire for light and made 
systematic hunt for signs of me. 

In his circling around the tent, widening out each 
time, he finally reached the dug-out and first found my 
footprints in the soft earth of the new roof. From 
these, he knew that I was alone and had climbed up 
the bluff. He could not understand it at all, why I 
should do such a crazy thing as to climb those steep 
rocks in the black of a moonless night, but he could 
follow, and he did. It was a great deal harder climb- 
ing for him than for me, who did not know I was 
climbing and cannot remember now how I ever did it ; 
but he made it, and came out on the summit of the 
bluff where we had planned that our signal staff and 
fire should be placed. 

I was not in sight, but there was something else 
which would have interested him more deeply if he 
had not been so anxious about me. It mystified him 
none the less, for it was that same blue white light on 
the horizon of the sea, big, bright and piercing, away 
off to the southwest. He could see it all the while he 
sought for me, and all that time it remained stationary 
as a star. But he knew it was not a star, for every 
104 


The Great White Light 

star in the heavens was obscured by clouds. It was 
some light of land or of sea, incomprehensible to him, 
shrouded in mystery. 

My footprints were no longer visible on the hard 
turf of the cape, although he searched with his torch 
for a sign of the tracks. The plateau was but little 
more than a quarter mile long, and he could have seen 
my figure in silhouette against the sky, even in the 
dim, night light. I had disappeared completely. 

Clear to the end of the jutting plateau, where the 
sea broke on the rocks in a tumult of surf and spray, 
he made his way and there he found me. I had 
climbed down a crevice in the cliffs and was sitting on 
a wet rock just above the spume of the breakers. Clad 
only in shirt and drawers, an imaginary fish-pole in my 
hands, I was evidently having great success as an 
angler of dream fish, frequently hauling in heavy ones 
that required great effort. If Stimson had not been so 
frightened at my perilous position, he must have 
laughed at the solemn manner that I baited and cast 
an imaginary hook into the water, waited for a bite, 
and jerked when it came, took off my prey and strung 
it on a twig, — all in a dream that made a quiet stream 
of the angry sea, a grassy bank in place of the cold 
rock. 

He knew then that I was asleep, had walked in my 
sleep and was dreaming now ; and he knew that if he 
awoke me there, I would probably drop at once into 
the waves, never to come up again. It was an impos- 
105 


Castaway Island 

sibility for him to get down to me and bring me safely 
back with him ; that would mean but the loss of both 
our lives. All that he could do was to wait for me, 
wait and hope that no great wave would carry me back 
with it. 

So he lay on the top of the bluff above me until I 
wound the dream line around the imagined pole ; lay 
in fear and trembling. He watched me stand on the 
narrow shelf of rock above the roaring surge and swirl 
of angry waters, his heart in his mouth. I could not 
have kept my place there one moment, had I been 
awake, for the fear and dizziness of the sea's tumult. 
But now I calmly bent over, picking up my string of 
invisible fish, which existed only in my over-tired 
brain, and climbed easily up as I had come down. I 
have no recollection of the dream that caused me to do 
all these strange things ; but I have of a great, bear-like 
hug which greeted me when I came over the edge of 
the cliff. 

“ What is the matter?" I asked sleepily, as one just 
awakened, rubbing my eyes in wonder at where I was. 

“ It's all right — all right now, Bobby boy ! You 
were asleep, walking in your sleep." 

“ But where am I ? And what is that light — the 
great light over there? " 

He set me down on my feet, feet which were now as 
cold as ice, and he looked long again at the light which 
so mystified us. Together we peered at it, forgetting 
the strangeness of our being there as we were, forget- 
106 


The Great White Light 

ting all else in the wonder of this phenomenon. Then 
he picked me up in his arms, warming my numb, wet 
body in his big clasp, and hurried me back to camp. 

'It was only when we were seated by a blazing fire, 
wrapped in blankets, and I had swallowed a cup of hot 
coffee, that he spoke of the light, answering my ques- 
tion. “ Bob,” he said, “ I give it up ! I don’t know 
and you don’t know what it is. I might guess a dozen 
things, but all I am sure of is that it is not a star or a 
comet.” 

“ What might it be? ” 

“ It might be a lighthouse, a light-ship or a bonfire ; 
a search-light or a forest fire ; a volcano or anything 
that will blaze big and burn steady. The color, that 
tinge of blue, makes me think it electricity, but it may 
be due to some odd kink in the atmosphere. It is the 
same light that we saw from the raft, Bobby.” 

I knew that ; there was no mistaking it. And I lay 
awake for a long time after Stimson was breathing hard 
in sleep, wondering at this white glow on the edge of 
the sea. If the captain was correct in his belief that it 
was electrical, then there was human ingenuity direct- 
ing it and there were people of our own kind within a 
score or so of miles. We might even signal them by 
smoke in the daytime or by fire at night. I went to 
sleep planning ways to communicate with a white spot 
of light on the sea. 

Directly after breakfast, we climbed again to the ex- 
tremity of the bluff, armed with the binoculars. I 
107 


Castaway Island 

shuddered when Stimson showed me the ledge from 
which I had fished the night before, and could hardly 
believe that, sleeping or waking, I had held a foot- 
hold on its narrow, slippery surface. From above, we 
scanned the sea throughout the extended range of the 
glasses, but it gave back no sign. There was sea and 
sea only to the horizon line. 

In Stimson’s eyes I saw the disappointment which 
he would not speak. He had expected explanation of 
the mystery of the light ; but he took the disappoint- 
ment with the same courage that had met all our pre- 
vious difficulties. 44 It proves to me/’ he said, 44 that 
the light must be an extremely powerful blaze, such as 
would be caused by electricity or by strong reflectors 
behind a great glow. I am even more convinced that 
it is caused by men with modern appliances. But they 
are a long way from us, Bob. We may not hope to 
signal so far, either by smoke or fire. Why, they can- 
not even see the island ! ” 

But we put up our signal staff and built a fire-wood 
pile that day, nevertheless, ready to signal should any 
vessel approach within reach of our beacon ; and we 
arranged that each morning one or the other of us 
should make the short trip to the bluff with the glasses 
to scan the sea for a sail. 44 That is the best we can do 
in the nature of precaution,” said the captain ; 44 and 
we will put in the balance of our time making our- 
selves a home here, and providing for our comfort. 
There is no danger from starvation or thirst; very 
108 


The Great White Light 

little, I am sure, of wild animals or wilder men. In 
fact, Bob, there is not much real difference in our situ- 
ation here and that of any pioneer in a new country, 
'miles from his nearest neighbor. We must forget that 
we are forcibly separated from others, and pretend that 
we are on a camping expedition in some new wilder- 
ness/’ 

“ Make it play, you mean ? ” 

Stimson placed a hand on my shoulder. He was 
talking with a seriousness that was not his habit, and 
his words came slowly. “ Bob,” he continued, “ I 
remember reading < Robinson Crusoe.’ You have read 
it, too, I suppose ? ” I nodded. “ The thing that struck 
me most in that remarkable story is the fear of things 
imaginative that oppressed his life. For years he was 
in constant horror of terrors of his mind. Do you 
understand what I mean, lad? When the dangers 
came, he met them bravely, intelligently, successfully ; 
but he ruined all his peace of mind by anticipating 
troubles, fearing for his life. We are going to learn 
from that, eh, Bob? We will meet trouble when it 
comes, but build none up in our minds to break our 
spirits.” 

“ Poor Crusoe did not have you with him, Captain,” 
I answered, and he laughed with heartiness. 

“ Perhaps you’ve guessed it, Robin. There are two 
of us, and that’s a hundred times more than one. Bad 
arithmetic, but good philosophy. Well, we will make 
the most of the conditions here as we find them and be 
109 


Castaway Island 

cheerful every minute that we can. So, to camp and 
to supper.” 

That word had a cheerful sound to me, and I knew 
that there were two fat chickens which Stimson had 
shot that morning, ready for the frying-pan in the 
cache. Fried chicken could make any boy forget that 
he was one of the two inhabitants of a desert island, 
especially when it was supported by hot stir-bread, 
baked in a pan tilted before the blaze of the fire, and 
coffee with plenty of sugar. We might remain on that 
island for as many years as Robinson Crusoe and, it 
seemed to me then, I should not greatly regret it. Our 
little camp with its fire glowing before the tent against 
the blackness of the night, with the rippling of the 
stream coming softly tc our ears, all in harmony with 
the good cheer of well-furnished stomachs, spoke a 
language to me of comfort and happiness. I did not 
care to change positions with any boy in the world. 
There were no clouds on the skies of my future. 


IIO 



CHAPTER IX 
THE LAKE BY THE WOODS 

“ T3 UN out in the barn-yard, Bob, and bring us 

JlV. some fresh laid eggs,” said Stimson next morn- 
ing, while we still lay rolled in our blankets. The 
words came to me in the pause between sleep and wak- 
ing and caused me no surprise. 

“ Certainly,” I replied, jumping to my feet and rub- 
bing my eyes vigorously. Then I laughed. “ I forgot 
we were castaways,” I said. “ How do you find wild 
hen's eggs ? ” 

“ I just heard one of our poultry give the proud 
iii 


Castaway Island 

cry of accomplishment, the 1 cut-cat — ca-daw-cut ’ of 
victory, down there where we saw them yesterday. 
That woke me and reminded me that soft-boiled eggs 
are very nourishing at breakfast time. Did you ever 
hunt hens’ nests in the barn ? ” 

“ Many a time. I found one once with twenty-four 
eggs.” 

“ More than plenty. Hunt these nests just the same 
way, substituting a wood for the barn and the long 
grass for hay. I’ll start the fire and have coffee and 
something else ready by the time you get back. Take 
the shotgun with you, but don’t shoot unless it’s well 
worth while. I have an idea for capturing and taming 
this poultry, and we don’t want to make it any wilder 
than it is, or frighten it off to the hills.” 

Before I had reached the edge of the wood where we 
had first seen the chickens I heard them get up and 
fly away through the trees. I broke through the 
underbrush where they had been, and found the signs 
of their roosting place in a dead tree a few rods from 
the forest’s rim. Then I began a careful search among 
the grass and dead leaves beneath the brush for nests. 
I had not poked around for many minutes before a 
wild flurry almost in my face made me jump as though 
shot. It was another hen, so close to me that I felt the 
wind of its beating wings as it shot by, flying low 
through the branches. 

That hen had been sitting on a nest when I nearly 
stepped on her, and in the nest were four eggs still 
1 12 


The Lake by the Woods 

warm from her body. I placed them in my hat for 
safety and continued the search. Soon I had found 
two more nests and added six more eggs to my collec- 
tion. This seemed the capacity of the hen-house, 
and I returned to Stimson with the fruits of my 
expedition. 

“ Bully doings ! ” he cried. “ Now we will candle 
them and see if they are fresh.” 

“ They do not seem to lay as many in a nest as our 
hens up north,” I remarked, telling him how I had 
found them, two and three to the nest. He was hold- 
ing an egg up toward the sun and squinting through 
it earnestly. 

“ This one is too old for our use, Bob/' he said, lay- 
ing the egg aside. “ And this is fresh, and this. An- 
other old one.” So he surveyed them all, placing six 
in the good pile and four in the discards. I knew the 
four that had been turned down were the four that I 
found first. The hen had been setting. 

“ Take these right back and put them as you found 
them, Bob,” the captain said. " She will come back to 
them, and in this warm sun they may not have been 
injured by removal. We will give her a chance to 
raise a brood, and we will take care of hen and chicks 
afterward.” 

I gathered them carefully in my hat. “ But do hens 
sit on four eggs in the Galapagos ? ” I enquired. 

“ Wild hens are apparently not as prolific in eggs as 
our tame poultry. Way back in the old Egyptian days 

113 


Castaway Island 

where hens are first recorded in history, an egg every 
six months was the capacity of the fowl. Science has 
built her up to a producing capacity of more than two 
hundred eggs a year, and some hens have bigger records 
than that. The Galapagos bird has the Egyptian 
beaten, but seems to be away shy of her Petaluma 
cousin. But run along and by the time you get back 
I’ll have these eggs ready for a test of taste.” 

The test of eating was entirely satisfactory. The 
eggs tasted exactly as well as any I had ever eaten and 
were an addition to our larder of the greatest impor- 
tance. “ We will soon have a chicken yard of our own, 
Bob,” the captain announced, “ with nests that will 
not have to be hunted. But first we must find food for 
the poultry and food for ourselves. Meat we have in 
plenty, fish, game and fowl. But we need fruit and a 
substitute for bread.” 

“ And milk,” I suggested. 

Stimson laughed. “ Trust a boy for wanting the 
impossible ! Have you ever drunk cocoa milk, Bob? ” 

I had never. “ It isn’t cow’s milk, and it doesn’t 
taste like milk at all, but it is mighty fine and refresh- 
ing. I won’t promise you even cocoa milk, but that is 
a chance. To-da}' we will go hunting milk, also fruit 
and bread. We will see how this stream becomes a 
river, Bob.” 

We set off down-stream, passing my glade of the 
echoes where I gave a demonstration of its capabilities 
in that line to the captain, and followed the brook as it 
114 


The Lake by the Woods 

curved and wound around the base of the hills, hugging 
close to their slope. The canyon was narrow but the 
decline was not severe and traveling was comparatively 
easy. Stimson estimated that the height of the brook 
above the sea at our camp was not more than two hun- 
dred feet, and as our compass showed us it was making 
a wide detour southward there could not be any serious 
falls if it was the river that we presumed it to be. 

Stimson was in front with the rifle, a compass and a 
pack of luncheon strung in a canvas on his back. I 
followed with the shotgun and the binoculars, a 
powder-horn and shot-pouch. We wore no coats, for 
the day was uncomfortably hot in the narrow canyon, 
even in the shade. Frequently we rested, drinking 
the cold water of the brook and watching the many 
birds that rose at our approach. Some were game 
birds, but we did not try to kill them, as we had no 
desire to increase the weight of our packs by another 
pound. 

At two o'clock we were still traveling in a southerly 
direction. At four the course of the stream turned to 
the east and Stimson estimated that we had come 
twelve miles from our camp. We had eaten our 
luncheon and the chance of our getting back to the 
tent for dinner was slight, unless we gave over the 
attempt at once. The captain opposed a return until 
we found the river's mouth. “ We will shoot some- 
thing or other for dinner, camp by the side of the 
stream and finish the journey to-morrow," he declared, 

115 


Castaway Island 

and I willingly agreed. He took the spatter gun and 
brought down a pair of wood pigeons before we had 
gone a quarter of a mile. “ This must be about the 
last stand of these birds/ 1 he said as he picked them 
up. “ The wood pigeon has disappeared entirely from 
North America, although at one time the birds flew in 
flocks so thick as to obscure the sun for hours at a 
time. When I was a boy I remember seeing one of the 
last of the big flights, and it lasted from before sunrise 
until nearly noon. Now I understand the Smithsonian 
Institute has offered a large reward for a wood pigeon’s 
nest. That shows how rapidly they have been ex- 
terminated and the need of game laws in a settled 
country.” 

“ What is that ? ” I asked, pointing at a glint of water 
through the trees. “ Is that the sea ? ” 

“ It can’t be,” Stimson answered, bending his head 
to bring it on a level with mine and gazing where I 
pointed. “ The sea is miles from here, and that water 
is close by. But it is either sea or lake, Robin. Come 
on ! We will find out.” 

He threw the pigeons into his canvas bag, reloaded 
the gun and we hurried down the stream. In a few 
moments we could see before us a wide expanse of 
water. “ A lake ! ” cried the captain. “ A fresh water 
lake, and a beauty, too ! Hurrah ! Why, this is al- 
most too good to be true, Bob ! I never hoped for such 
luck. But look out ! Don’t get into the marsh down 
there.” 

116 



4 A LAKE ! ” CRIED THE CAPTAIN 































The Lake by the Woods 

The stream where it entered the lake widened out 
into a swamp, and in this swamp were growing tall 
bamboos that looked like elongated corn stalks. “ Fish- 
poles/' I cried, pointing, and Stimson smiled. 

“ Fish-poles and lots more beside,” he answered. 
“ Posts, girders and rafters for a house, furniture for 
it, pails and cups, and casks for our raft. Those bam- 
boo are better for us than a gold-mine.” 

We skirted the swamp and reached the shore of the 
lake at a place where the trees ran down so close to the 
water that the branches were above its surface. Here 
we could get view of the length and breadth of our body 
of water and found that it was oval in shape, about a 
mile long and half that in its widest part. On this 
side, the easternly, the woods were thick to the water’s 
edge, and the underbrush made of it an almost im- 
passable jungle. But across the water we could see 
palms growing on a seeming stretch of grass lawn. 
To the south and behind the palms to the west were 
the mountains. 

We must cross the lake and make our night’s camp 
over there,” said Stimson, indicating with his hand the 
palm grove, a half-mile away. “ It is too late to go 
back around the bamboo swamp or break through these 
woods. Can you swim it, Bob?” 

I measured the distance with a doubtful eye. “ Not 
if I carry the rifle,” I answered. 

Stimson laughed. “ We’ll raft the guns and packs 
and push them before us and we’ll make the shortest 
ii 7 


Castaway Island 

route for the other beach. Come on, Bob ; I will help 
you,” and the captain led me back over our trail to the 
edge of the marsh. 

Here he picked out two pieces of broken bamboo, 
which he bound together with a strip of canvas and on 
which he tied the guns, glasses, compass, ammunition 
and all the clothes which we stripped off. Then push- 
ing this before him, he waded out into the lake, I fol- 
lowing. It shallowed gradually for several rods, then 
pitched off abruptly into deep water. Warned by the 
change in color, Stimson, who was up to his armpits, 
gave the raft a shove ahead and began to swim. I had 
been used to swimming in salt water, had learned in 
the tank baths of San Francisco and had swum in the 
surf of the Pacific and the waters of its bays. This 
lake seemed to have no buoyancy. I sank deep in it 
and it would not support me. It made me struggle to 
keep my head above, to push my body through it. I 
swam hard and puffed with the exertion. 

“ What is the trouble? ” asked Stimson, coming to 
my side. 

“ It is hard swimming. It does not hold me,” I 
gasped. 

“ You aren’t used to fresh water. Take it easy now, 
Bob. Get down low in it, just your lips above. All 
under but your face. That’s right. See, now it holds 
you. Why, you can float in it without moving a 
muscle ! You can’t lie on top of fresh water as you 
might in Salt Lake ; you swim through it, not over it. 

1 1 8 


The Lake by the Woods 

Got the hang of it now ? Then follow me and we’ll 
take it easily going across.” 

Reassured, I struck out with long strokes, swim- 
ming on my side, kicking deep, and found that I made 
good progress with little more exertion than in the 
sea. There were no waves to buffet and so no excuse 
for thrusting head and neck above the surface. In 
fact it was an easy swim as I became used to the 
different medium, and in a short time Stimson was 
leading me in a walk through the shallowed water to 
the shore. 

“ Never thought once of alligators,” the captain ex- 
claimed as we resumed our clothes. “ Just as apt as 
not to be ’gators in that lake, though they would not 
bother us, kicking as we were. But before we bathe 
in it again we’ll make a survey for signs of the rep- 
tiles.” 

I was glad he had not mentioned it before we started 
or while we were making the crossing. Now I looked 
back over the surface, expecting to see a dozen or more 
of the wide-mouthed animals of the picture books 
following our path in. But there was no ripple of the 
surface. 

“ It’s a pretty little lake,” declared Stimson, drying 
his hair with his hands. “ It’s just an ideal spot for a 
home, and if I’m not mistaken, the grove over there 
has nearly all the requirements of a farm. I think I 
can promise you a fine dinner to-night, Bob. What 
would you say to bananas ? ” 

119 


Castaway Island 

“ Are those banana trees ? ” 

“ Some of those palms look very like it, and some I 
might believe were cocoa palms if we were a few thou- 
sand miles more to the westward. But we shall know 
in a few moments. Come on.” 

We had bananas and a pineapple for dinner. We 
might have had cocoa milk too, for there were cocoa 
palms in the grove, but there was no immediate 
means of getting at the fruit, so high up it was amid 
the plumes. Stimson promised to gather some in the 
morning, but now the sun was setting with a sheen 
of red across the lake. Thousands of birds in great 
flocks were hurrying to their night trees in the forest 
or to the feeding grounds in the marsh at the lake’s 
end. Beside a little camp-fire built for the cooking 
of our pigeons we ate the delicious fruit of the tropics, 
bananas that had a flavor so different and precious 
that none knows it who has not plucked the ripe 
fruit fresh from the trees, and pineapple that seemed 
nectar. 

We had brought no blankets. We lay down one at 
either side of the fire, for the nights were beginning to 
have a chill, and Stimson planned the house we should 
build here beside the lake under the palms. There 
must be a water-proof roof, for the rainy season was 
due almost any time now and we might expect fre- 
quent showers and storms. He would hunt the nipa/ 
he said, the leaves of which would make perfect 
shingles. Nipa leaves, bamboo timbers, rattan for 
120 


The Lake by the Woods 

binding, and we should have a hut that would be 
weather-proof and as comfortable as we could desire. 

Our conversation grew intermittent, and I lost track 
of it at times as my eyes became heavy with sleep. 
Then the captain stopped entirely and I heard him 
yawn, sigh comfortably and begin to breathe the regular 
rhythm of sleep. I was wandering far away into 
dreamland when I heard the tramp, tramp, tramp of 
many feet far away. At first it did not mean any- 
thing to me, was but a part of my dream, but it became 
insistent and awoke me. I raised to my elbow, heard 
nothing and sank back. As soon as my head struck 
the ground I heard it again, many feet marching in 
unison. It was a sound of the earth at my ear, not of 
the air, for when I lifted my head again, it was gone. 

I started to wake Stimson, then paused. Might it 
be I was mistaken, that I had dreamed ? I laid my 
ear to the ground and listened. I was certainly wide 
awake now, and I heard it ; farther away but distinct. 
I shook Stimson excitedly. 

“ What is it, Bob?” he cried, immediately alive to 
his surroundings. 

“Some one walking — many people walking,” I an- 
swered hurriedly. “ Put your ear to the ground and 
listen.” 

He did as I did. There was no sound now. I 
waited for many seconds, but could hear nothing. 
Stimson raised his head first. “ Were you not dream- 
ing? ” he asked. 


1 21 


Castaway Island 

“ No ; I heard." 

'‘Tell me just what/' he said, seriously enough. 

“ It was a long way off,” I began, hunting for words 
to describe it exactly. “ There were many feet, keep- 
ing step, walking together. It was the sound of a 
procession passing at a distance.” 

“ Voices? ” 

“ No voices, just footsteps. Men’s footsteps.” 

“Might it not have been a dream?” he asked again. 

“ No, Captain. At first I thought it might, then I 
heard it again when I was wide awake, much lower than 
before, hardly distinct enough to hear. It was march- 
ing people.” 

“ In what direction ? ” 

I pointed across the lake toward its farther end. 
Stimson reached for the rifle, and I heard him throw a 
cartridge into the chamber. The fire had burned down 
to embers and these now he extinguished, throwing 
dirt upon them with his hands. All was dark except 
for the pale starlight reflecting from the lake. 

I started to speak again, but he silenced me with his 
hand on my arm. He was listening. Now and then 
he placed his ear to the ground, then strained his eyes 
into the darkness across the lake. A half hour we sat 
there together without sound, hearing nothing, seeing 
nothing. 

“ Go to sleep, Bob,” he said finally. “ I shall keep 
watch.” 

“ What was it?” I asked in a whisper. 

122 


The Lake by the Woods 

“ I do not know. I hope it was a dream.” 

I shook my head. “ Not that, Captain,” I said. “ I 
am sure it was not a dream,” but I lay down beside 
him and went to sleep, he watching the end of the lake 
with a cocked rifle in his hands. 


123 



CHAPTER X 
THE DOGS 

S TIMSON had breakfast all ready before be called 
me in the morning. Although he had not slept 
since I awakened him, he seemed as fresh as ever, and 
sent me for a plunge in the lake before the meal. “ I'll 
give you cocoa milk instead of coffee,” he promised, for 
he had gone back to the swamp and cut a long bamboo, 
to which he had attached his knife in such fashion 
that he was able to clip some of the nuts from their 
stems high up in the palms. 

“ Did you hear anything more last night ? ” I asked, 
as I disrobed for my swim. He shook his head and 
changed the subject, but I looked long in the direction 
of the marching feet as I took my bath. 

It was Stimson’s idea that we should continue down 
the river to the sea as we first intended, but I was 
124 


The Dogs 

anxious to explore the lake and he readily agreed that 
we spend the morning, at least, in finding out what 
our new possessions held for us. I had brought the 
fish-line and soon found a place where I could cast into 
deep water from the shore. While I sought to learn 
what the lake held in store, he took the shotgun and 
made a circuit through the grove, intending to come 
out on the shore at its southern end and meet me there. 

I heard him shoot twice before he had gone fifteen 
minutes, but that was the only indication of his where- 
abouts. I was catching fish and having wonderful 
luck, strange fish to me, but evidently ravenous and 
not afraid of hooks beneath the bait. There was a 
species of perch with a long upper fin and a small pike 
which bit hungrily and fought gamely. It was fine 
sport, and I was sorry when the sun indicated it was 
time to put aside the line and begin the journey to the 
lake’s end. 

I shouldered the rifle, picked up my string of fish 
and wandered along the pebbled beach. Before me 
flew a flock of plover, keeping just far enough ahead 
to be out of my way, alighting to bob about on their 
slender legs until I came, then flying ahead to a new 
ground to wait for me. They were so tame that I 
might have killed them with stones had I wished, but 
X watched them instead. They were much more gay 
of color than the Californian plover, rich cousins of 
the northern family. 

At the end of the lake was a slow flowing stream, 
125 


Castaway Island 

deep and wide, the outlet river, and I sat down on its 
bank awaiting the captain’s coming. Whatever I had 
heard or thought I heard the night before came from 
near here. If it was men, and that was surely the only 
explanation of the rhythmic tread, their footprints^ 
might be visible in the soft sand of the lake or on 
the farther bank of this stream. I decided to search, 
and the first necessity was that I be on the other side 
of the river. 

It was nothing to swim it. I took off my clothes 
and rolled them into a little pack that I might carry 
them with me ; then I remembered what Stimson had 
said about alligators. This slow, sluggish river would 
be an ideal place for the saurians. I hesitated, look- 
ing down the river for sight of anything resembling 
a log floating on its surface. I had never seen an 
alligator in its native haunt, but I had seen pictures of 
them, and I began to imagine great, scaly heads with 
mouths agape, showing monster teeth, lifting from the 
water. I began putting on my clothes again and was 
half dressed when Stimson came from the woods, his 
arms filled with fruits and plants. He dropped them 
to the ground beside me. 

“Been swimming?” he asked, casually. I shook 
my head. “ Going over to the other side, then ? ” he 
said, less a question than a deduction from my half- 
clothed condition. 

“ I gave up the idea,” I answered. I did not like 
to admit I had been scared out of the idea. 

126 


The Dogs 

“ I was over there this morning,” he said, “ before 
you were up.” 

“ Looking for tracks? ” I asked quickly. 

“ Yes. There wasn’t a sign. Why didn’t you 
cross ? ” 

I hung my head. “ Alligators,” I admitted. “ 1 
got scared.” 

Stimson laughed. “ Good boy ! You’re not too 
scared to admit you were scared, and that’s the test of 
a coward. I was scared, too, and we both have every 
reason to be cautious, for we have no knowledge of 
what we are running into here. Keep on being scared 
and I’ll not feel afraid to leave you alone.” 

That made me feel better and the captain showed 
me what he had gathered on his exploring trip. He 
had oranges, mangoes and guavas, mummy apples and 
a breadfruit. “ It will take the place of the flour the 
monkeys spoiled,” he said. “ Eat all you want of the 
fruit, Bob. Try an orange.” 

“ It isn’t ripe,” I declared, for it was green, not 
yellow. 

“ Try it and see.” 

It was sweeter than any orange I had ever tasted, 
luscious and juicy. “ That’s because it ripened on the 
tree,” explained Stimson. “ You rarely see an orange 
picked ripe even in San Francisco. They are plucked 
long before they begin to change color, and ripen in 
the box. Over yonder ” — he waved his hand to indi- 
cate the grove — “ is a great garden with coffee, tea, 
127 


Castaway Island 

fruits and berries, almost everything we’ll need, 
Bobbin. Put your lips to that. What does it taste 
like ? ” He handed me a piece of cane. 

“ Sugar,” I answered. 

“ Bight you are ; sugar cane. Is there anything 
else in the eating line you think of or want? If so, 
I’ll go back and take another look.” 

He was enthusiastic and his eyes were gleaming. 
“ Nature may have done all this for the chance cast- 
away,” he continued, “ but I doubt it. It is too com- 
plete, and there are many varieties of plants that do 
not belong by rights to this section of the globe. It 
looks to me as though man had a hand in its planting 
once upon a time.” 

“ Were there signs of any one having lived there?” 

“ No. It is all wild and tangled, overgrown with 
underbrush. If my guess is right and it was once a 
farm, it was many years ago. But that would explain 
the chickens, Bob.” 

It would not explain the footsteps I had heard last 
night, and as I thought of that I remembered I had 
heard Stimson shoot just after leaving me. He had 
brought no game back with him. “ What did you 
shoot, Captain ? ” I asked. 

He was rising and his back was toward me. As he 
made no answer, I thought he had not heard, and re- 
peated the question. 

“ Snake,” he answered shortly ; then after a minute, 
“The snake in the garden of Eden.” He laughed 
128 


The Dogs 

lightly. “ Never mind, Bob, there are usually flies in 
the ointment, you know. That snake will not bother 
us again, but keep your eyes open for them, mind I ” 

With a shudder I promised that I would. I had no 
love of snakes of any kind, and I knew from the tone 
of Stimson's word that the snake he had killed was 
venomous. Again I determined to keep my eyes on 
the ground and watch each step through the jungle 
grass. 

We had made our lunch of the fruits the captain 
brought from the grove, and now we started on our 
explorations to follow the river's course. We did not 
attempt a crossing, continuing along its southern bank 
in a general easterly direction. As we proceeded 
Stimson expressed his astonishment at the course of 
the stream. “ We are at least twenty miles from our 
old camp and still going farther away," he explained. 
“ The mouth of the river which we believe is this river 
is not more than five miles from camp. Do you sup- 
pose this stream takes such a big sweep back as that?" 

“ It may have to in order to get around those hills. 
We have been winding around in every direction since 
we started along it. It doesn't care a bit which way 
it runs." 

We came to an explanation of the matter before we 
had gone a mile farther, for the stream emptied into a 
much larger river, flowing north. Even before we 
saw it, we could hear the roar of its waters as it dashed 
through a narrow ravine in the mountains. Beyond 
129 


Castaway Island 

it were abrupt cliffs, bare rocks that showed the same 
formation as the ground beyond the river’s mouth. 
Behind the cliffs were untimbered mountains. 

“ This, I feel sure, marks the eastern limit of fertility 
of our island,” declared the captain. 44 Those barren 
rocks probably run to the coast.” 

44 There may be forests on their eastern slopes,” I 
said. 

44 No, they are volcanic formation and make the 
coast line cliffs, I have no doubt. We know the north 
half of the island fairly well now, for our signal flies 
at its northwest point and we have explored to its 
center. What is south of us and along the western 
coast I haven’t a guess, but I am confident there is 
nothing east but crags and rocks. When we circum- 
navigate the island ” 

44 Are we going to sail around it? ” I asked eagerly. 

Stimson sat down in the shadow of a rock where he 
could look down on the swift running river, dashing 
madly on its way to the sea. 44 Bob,” he said, 44 we are 
going to be here some time, I am thinking, for we are 
way off the course of the steamers, and outside the line 
of the coast traders’ route. The nearest of the South 
Sea groups that is civilized is several thousand miles to 
the west ; Ecuador is six hundred miles east. To at- 
tempt either one by any means in our power is too 
hopeless to consider, so we are probably located here 
for a long enough period to figure on it as permanent. 
We’ll accept that as fact, Bob, and we’ll make it a 
130 


The Dogs 

home and have the best kind of a time possible while 
we are here. We’ll have no mourning or regrets, no 
tears or sad faces. We are sure of food, for there are 
fish, birds and even chickens, and I have no doubt 
deer, goats and other eatable beasts, besides the best of -» 
fruit and vegetables. But before we settle down to 
home building and a satisfied permanent residence, we 
must know for certain that there are no residents of 
this island and no other island close by that is occupied. 
So we will fix up the raft in a way that will give us a 
manageable boat and — — ” 

Stimson was interrupted by the barking of a dog. It 
seemed so natural to me, unused as I was to the uncom- 
monness of commonplaces in the midst of the wilder- 
ness, that I might not have noticed the distant sound, 
half drowned by the roar of the stream. But I was 
watching the captain’s face as he talked and the look 
that came over it as he heard the barking was so ex- 
pressive of astonishment that it set my heart quaking. 

“ It is a dog,” I said, and the thought came to me at 
my words — why was a dog there in the Galapagos ? 

“It is dogs — two dogs. Jiminetty ! Dogs — here? 
Can there be dogs where there are no men ? There are 
wild hens — are there wild dogs, too? ” 

“ Maybe wolves,” I suggested timidly, looking up 
the canyon of the stream where the barking was be- 
coming louder every moment. 

“ Wolves, no ! Dogs — plain, every-day dogs ! They 
are as different in their barks as a cow and a fog-horn. 

131 


Castaway Island 

I know ’em. These are house dogs, Bob, and they are 
out on a hunt.” 

“ Then there must be men on the island.” 

“ That we have got to find out, and find out quickly 
— to-day, this afternoon. Suppose we have been moon- 
ing around thinking that we are lonely shipwrecked 
castaways on a desert island while a village of men 
with bakeries and milk cows are a half dozen miles 
away ! What fools we should be ! ” 

“ Suppose they should be Indians ? ” 

“ No, Bob, we are not going to suppose anything. 
We are going to find out. If there are any stray 
natives on these supposedly uninhabited islands we 
are as anxious to know it before they know we are 
here as if they were a colony of white men. We are 
going to find those dogs first and then take a general 
view of this island from as high up that mountain as 
we can get. Carry all of that fruit that you can lug 
and give me the rifle.” 

Stimson was really excited, which he rarely was. 
We set out up the river in the direction of the still 
sounding, snapping barks of the dogs. I could tell 
now that there were two, one bark being pitched in a 
much higher key than the other, and they were coming 
down the canyon of the stream. It was hard traveling. 
Every few rods there was a wall of rock that we had to 
scale, and it was up, up, all the time. I was so badly 
winded at the end of the first quarter hour that I called 
to Stimson to wait for me and sat down to rest. 

132 


The Dogs 

It was much hotter here in the canyon than it had 
been on the lake's shore, and I was bathed in perspi- 
ration. I put my face deep in the brook and washed 
my chest and arms with the cold water. Stimson took 
occasion to follow my example and, rested somewhat, 
we resumed the climb. 

There was no doubt that the dogs were getting 
nearer to us now. When we first heard them they 
must have been miles away, for even now they were 
not in sight and we could see for some distance up the 
canyon. Stimson had stopped at this comparatively 
open place and we arranged ourselves to meet the dogs 
behind a large rock. There was to be no shooting 
unless he fired first, and we waited with cocked guns 
while the chase in full cry came bounding toward us. 

With great leaps down the steep mountainside 
came a frightened deer, head high in air, nostrils quiv- 
ering and great eyes wide in terror. It passed us like 
the wind, never noticing our nearness, and we watched 
for its pursuers at the place where it had broken into 
the open. A minute later and they came into view, 
two big dogs running with noses close to the ground, 
baying at every leap. Stimson stepped from our con- 
cealment directly in their path and cried to them in 
Spanish, words of command which I did not under- 
stand. They saw him and paused for a minute, their 
baying stopped. Then, with angry barks, they dashed 
directly for him. 

I never supposed a Mauser rifle could spit lead so 
i33 


Castaway Island 

quickly. I shot a load of bird pellets at the rear 
canine as rapidly as I could pull stock to shoulder; then 
three spurts of flame from the muzzle of the captain’s 
rifle, seemingly coming all together, and the two dogs 
were rolling on the ground in their death agonies. 
“ Wild as wolves,” said Stimson calmly. “ I don’t 
believe that they ever saw man before in their lives. 
I was just a new kind of animal to them and they 
thought I was good to eat. Dogs they are, but if there 
are many of them on this island we shall have to look 
after ourselves more carefully than if they were 
panthers. Wild dogs are no joke ! ” 

We were looking over the carcasses as he spoke, and 
they were evidently a mongrel breed of dogs, short 
haired, with long tails and hanging ears, somewhat 
larger and much stronger than a deerhound. “ How 
did they come here?” I asked. “ Dogs are not nat- 
urally wild animals, are they ? ” 

“ No. There isn’t a trace anywhere of a primeval 
dog. There is the dhole of India and the dingo of 
Australia, both wild dogs, but they are known to be 
descended from domestic animals. Dogs will become 
wild after a generation away from man, but they must 
have had their start, parents or grandparents or further 
back, from the house dog. If there are not men on 
this island now, there have been some time in the past, 
and they brought the forebears of these dead brutes 
over from the mainland.” 

“ You are not sure yet that there are no men here now ? ” 
i34 


The Dogs 

“ Not satisfied, no. Pretty well convinced that these 
dogs have had no masters, yes. It leaves us prac- 
tically where we were before, not sure of anything. 
We will skin these brutes, for their pelts will be useful 
to us in the making of clothes later on, and we will 
then climb the mountain to some place where we can 
overlook a part, at least, of the island.” 

With our knives we fell to, Stimson showing me the 
way, and soon had the skins removed from the two 
carcasses. Then we resumed our climb, finding the 
ascent more abrupt beyond this open space. We made 
slow progress, hanging on to brush and wedging our 
feet into the crevices of the rock, but every step was a 
gain in altitude. We had kept to the stream’s course 
and had been all the time among the trees of the wood, 
but now all underbrush disappeared. We were be- 
yond the river’s source and above the timber line. 
Nothing but rocks and the jagged tops of the moun- 
tains showed above us. 

All the west side of the island lay beneath us within 
range of our eyes. Far to the north we could see the 
bluff where our signal pole stood and the glass showed 
us the flag still waving. That was the northwestern 
tip of our possessions. 


i35 



CHAPTER XI 
THE MARCHING FEET 

H AD we not been so late in starting our ascent of 
the mountain we would have had some ad- 
vantage in our investigation, for now the sun lay close 
against the horizon of the water and cast a stream of 
light across the sea that was dazzling. It told us, too, 
that night was but a short while ahead and we must 
make preparation for it. Without more than a casual 
survey of the topography of the land, we began the 
gathering of fire-wood and the preparation of our even- 
ing meal. 

The night was cool here, a thousand or more feet 
above the sea’s level, and we had no blankets. There 
was a brisk breeze from the southwest and we found a 
sheltering rock to windward behind which to make 
camp. Fire-wood was brought up from below, and we 
gathered enough for a fire in the night, which gave us 
13b 


The Marching Feet 

comfort during the long hours that we could not sleep. 
I had but little rest, what with the cold and the hard 
rocks of my couch, and Stimson slept in cat-naps. 

At daybreak we were up and at our task of survey- 
ing the island. There was no delay for breakfast, as 
all our provisions had been eaten. With the binocu- 
lars, Stimson studied the land as it lay below us, while 
I marked down on a sheet taken from the log-book 
a chart of the coast. It was sunrise, and the clouds 
were opalescent, pearl, rose and olive, in the west. 
Beneath, the sea reflected their colors in paler tints. 
Closer yet was the yellow and green of the long slope 
that ended at the mountain’s base ; yellow in its seared 
meadows and green where the trees grew around the 
watercourses. 

But nowhere on sea or land was there sign of human 
habitation or human visitation. From this height 
Stimson sought that place in the sea where we had 
seen the blue white light the night I walked in my 
sleep. As far as eye could reach or the glasses carried 
sight, there was no break in the expanse of the sea. 
Neither was there on the island to the west and 
north any sign of smoke from camp-fire or chimney. 
It was all deserted except for the animals and birds of 
the forests. 

“ We are alone on the island, Bob,” the captain de- 
clared with finality after an hour’s study. “ There is 
no other man here but us.” 

“ We still have the southern end and the east coast 
i37 


Castaway Island 

beyond the river’s mouth,” I suggested, for I had yet 
in mind the sound of tramping feet that came through 
the earth to my ear. “ There’s yet a chance, Captain.” 

Stimson smiled. “ We’ll make certain when we 
circumnavigate the island,” he said, “ but I am con- 
vinced now. Shall we get back to the pineapple and 
banana orchard and have breakfast ? ” 

I was glad of the suggestion and we went down the 
mountain much more expeditiously than we had 
climbed it, and were soon at the point where the 
streams converged. Here we had left a supply of fruit, 
and while I made a fire Stimson wandered back up 
the stream toward the lake, promising to return with 
game by the time I had coffee boiled. He was better 
than his word, for I heard the gun boom before he 
was five minutes gone, and he was as quickly back with 
a half dozen of the plover I had seen along the lake 
shore before. These we broiled over the coals and 
made a hearty meal. 

“ Bob,” said the captain when we had completed, 
“ you may take your choice, either back up the stream 
to camp or down the river to its mouth and back by the 
beach. I don’t care. We are satisfied now that this 
is the river that enters the sea at the bay, and to travel 
down it is useless. As for distance, one route is prob- 
ably about as long as the other. Which shall it be ? ” 

I chose the new land, the river route, just because it 
was new. Before we had gone a mile on its course I 
was sorry of my choice. The river ran between steep 
138 


The Marching Feet 

banks and progress was difficult on these side hills. 
In places we were able to wade along the stream’s bed, 
but these were few and short, for most of the way the 
river ran deep and strong. It was noon when we came 
out upon the beach five miles from our camp. 

That afternoon we packed ready for removal. That 
night we slept for the last time in our V-tent beside 
the stream. In the morning I visited our signal flag 
and surveyed the sea with the binoculars. Then we 
started down the stream, our camp equipage on a litter 
between us, making for our new home on the banks of 
Lake Plentiful. 

I had named the lake. Stimson suggested that we 
should save misunderstandings, now that we had so 
many possessions, by giving them names. “ It was all 
right to say * The stream ’ when there was but one 
stream or 4 The bay/ if there were not so many bays 
along this coast. But as we are the discoverers and 
therefore have the right, and as there are going to be 
more and more places to get mixed up over,, let’s start 
in now and name those that we have. I suggest * Wreck 
Bay ’ as the name of the cove where we came ashore.” 

“ And ‘ Coral Bay ’ for the one where the river flows 
in, the bay of the coral spit,” I assisted. 

“ ‘ Signal Point ’ goes naturally with the bluff where 
the flag stands, and this stream we might call * Howler 
Creek.’ ” 

“ Because of the monkeys ? ” I asked. “ It isn’t a 
very pretty name for such a pretty stream.” 

139 


Castaway Island 

“ Then you suggest a name.” 

“ Let’s call the lake ‘ Lake Plentiful ’ and the stream 
* Comfort Creek.’ ” 

“ And the river ? ” 

“ ‘ Roaring River/ on account of its noise.” 

So we had names for almost everything and found 
it much easier to refer to them that way, after we got 
used to it. We went down Comfort Creek as we had 
before, only we crossed to its western side just before 
we came to Bamboo Swamp so that we need not again 
swim the lake. We had started early, and there was 
time enough before dark to get up our tent and make 
an excursion into the grove for fruit. 

Stimson and I went together, for he was afraid of 
our being separated until we had more thoroughly 
explored the grove, and I, remembering the snake he 
had shot, was glad enough to have him by with the shot- 
gun. But I soon forgot all about snakes in the beauty 
of the trees. These were mostly palms, some tall and 
straight with feathery tufts of leaves at their very 
tops, others short and clumpy with great wide hang- 
ing leaves starting almost at the bottom. I soon saw 
what I thought were bananas on one of the smaller 
palms and called the captain’s attention to them. 

“ Plantains,” he declared. “ See, Bob? The fruit 
of the plantain points upward on the stem and is 
reddish in color, while the banana hangs down and 
is yellow. But that plantain is even a more valuable 
discovery than the banana, for it is better and more 
140 


The Marching Feet 

nourishing food. Bake or boil them and you’ll believe 
you are eating sweet potatoes.” 

“ And there is a muskmelon growing on that tree ! ” 

The captain laughed. “ That is breadfruit, Bob. 
We will have one baked to-morrow. I’ll show you. 
And then I will make up a batch of poi of the bread- 
fruit, bananas and cocoa milk. I think you will forget 
any craving for wheat bread when you have learned 
to know poi.” 

We located a place for our house among the trees 
some ten rods back from the lake, beside a little spring 
of ice cold water, and the next day we began construc- 
tion. First we leveled off a piece of ground twelve 
by sixteen feet, digging out the mould and sod until 
we came to solid earth. This, beaten hard, would be 
our floor. At each corner we dug a hole and planted 
bamboo uprights showing ten feet above ground. 

The roof we constructed in four sections on the 
ground, each piece a triangle of bamboo, woven tightly 
with split bamboo and tied with rattan soaked in 
the lake until it was almost as pliable as rope. Over 
this framework, laid on like shingles, or more like 
thatch, we made a three-ply covering of nipa leaves, 
each leaf being about three inches wide and two feet 
long. Then with arduous labor we hoisted up our 
sectional roof and strung it by rope and rattan to the 
wall posts. 

It was several days’ work before we had the roof 
completed and up and the side walls woven with split 
141 


Castaway Island 

bamboo. We had left window and door openings, 
but as we had no glass we decided to have canvas 
curtains at the former and use a part of our raft to 
build a firm, strong door for the latter. Except for 
this door, there had not been a nail used in the entire 
construction of the house, but the rattan bindings of 
the joints dried hard, shrinking to tightness in the 
process, and when all completed the hut was strong 
enough to withstand almost any wind that might blow. 

In the meantime I had eaten my first meal of poi. 
Stimson illustrated how the Kanakas ate the glutinous 
mess by sticking a forefinger into the pot and dexter- 
ously twirling the stringy poi that clung to the finger 
into such shape that it might be placed in the mouth, 
but I did not like the methods of the South Sea island- 
ers half as well as I did their food. Poi was good, 
but I preferred it cold when it hardened, and could 
be cut into slices like cheese. 

It was one day shortly after the house was finished 
that we woke up in the morning to a driving rain 
that beat hard down on a stiff southwestern gale. 
There had been nothing the day before to indicate the 
end of summer, and it was only Stimson’s general 
knowledge of climatic conditions in these latitudes 
that found us as well prepared as we were. We had 
dry fire-wood and a supply of fruit, plantains and 
breadfruit, so there was no need to wander forth in 
the drenching rain, and we kept to the hut and passed 
the day weaving a coarse mesh for the chicken yard 
142 


The Marching Feet 

fence, while the skies emptied on our nipa leaf roof 
and cleansed and sweetened the trees of the grove. 

I was aroused that night from deep sleep by Stimson's 
favorite ejaculation, “ Jiminetty I ” and found him sit- 
ting up in bed beside me. 

“What is it?” I whispered, but he silenced me with 
a stern “ Hush ! ” Then I heard what I had heard one 
night before, the tramp of many feet over and above 
the noise of the rain on the roof. 

The camp-fire in the center of the hut had burned 
down to embers, but by its dim light I could see Stim- 
son’s eyes grow round with astonishment and his 
hand reach for the rifle which always stood close to his 
bed. Then he moved slowly, cautiously, to the hut's 
door and opened it, I following. 

The sound was clearer now, and it was unmistakable. 
Footfalls of slow plodding men, a score or more of men, 
walking in step, going away from us. Again I started 
to question Stimson, but he motioned me quickly to 
silence. Into the night that his eyes were attempting 
to pierce I gazed, seeing naught but the dense black- 
ness, and as we peered the sound lessened and died 
away into the dripping of rain-drops. “ Jiminetty ! ” 
breathed Stimson again and he closed the door. 

“ What was it ? ” I asked, my voice low. 

Stimson sat down on his bed, still grasping the rifle. 
“ Bob,” he answered, and there was amazement in his 
voice, “ anywhere else, that would be infantry march- 
ing. Here, I haven't a guess as to what it was. The 
M3 


Castaway Island 

feet of many men would make that sound, but what 
else could — and it must be something else — I don’t 
know. Go to sleep again, Bob ; go to sleep.” 

But it was many hours before I could sleep. 



144 



CHAPTER XII 
IN THE NICK OF TIME 

F OR four days it rained all day and all night, then the 
sun came again, first shyly peeping through a rift 
in gray clouds that waved it back with a final shower. 
An hour later it was out in its strength, sucking up 
the moisture and warming the sands and foliage of the 
trees. 

We burst from our prison with cheers and were soon 
at work building a chicken yard, gathering more fuel 
and stores of fruit and supplies. Then the storms re- 
turned with added intensity. It was the afternoon of 
the second day inside the hut that Stimson, gazing 
from the window, cried, “ Ducks, Bob ! Bring the 
gun ! ” and ran from the hut. 

It was a large flock of mallards coming in on the 
wind. They had evidently sighted the refuge of our 
lake and made down for it on whirring wings as Stim- 
1 4S 


Castaway Island 

son with the rifle and I with loaded shotgun dived into 
some bushes close to the beach. Swinging in a wide 
circle, they took the water up the lake near Bamboo 
Swamp. 

The rain soaked us to the skin as we crouched in the 
wet brush. It was not warm rain, either, such as the 
first storm had been, but held the chill of winter in the 
north. We had seen ducks before on the lake, teal, 
widgeon, red-heads and other kinds which neither of 
us knew, but only in pairs or small flocks. Here were 
mallards, a hundred or more, closely bunched, and it 
was too good hunting to be given over for cold or wet. 

I suggested that we make a circuit and approach the 
ducks from the marsh, but Stimson counseled patience. 
“ Stay right where you are, Bob,” he commanded. 
“ Keep the breech of your gun beneath your coat to 
keep it dry, and smile if you can. It isn’t pleasant 
waiting, but we’re sure to get a shot into them sooner 
or later, for they’ll come by us, as certain as fate ! ” 

We could hear them quacking among themselves, 
talking things over at the end of the lake. The wind 
was from the north and strong, so that to hold their 
position against it the ducks were obliged to keep pad- 
dling. Stimson argued that they would sooner or later 
take the easier way and blow down past us. “ Those 
birds are tired out, Bob. They have probably flown 
from San Francisco Bay or the Suisun marshes in the 
last week, and they need rest and quiet. By and by 
they’ll be on their way with the wind behind them.” 

146 


In the Nick of Time 


It required patience to wait with the rain running 
down our necks and shivering along our spines. But 
Stimson only laughed and shook his head when I sug- 
gested that I go around and get beyond them, hurry- 
ing them along. “ They'll come," he declared. 

And they did. The flock parted, a dozen or more 
breaking away, heading toward us. Then all seemed 
to realize that the minority was in the right and the 
great flock came down the lake. “ Aim for the near 
side of the bunch where it is thickest and fire both 
barrels," commanded the captain. “ I will give the 
word." 

The leaders went by us not ten rods away, blowing 
swiftly. As the main body of the flock came along- 
side I aimed into their midst and as Stimson said 
“ Fire," pulled both triggers. The recoil was tremen- 
dous, and I sat down hard in the bushes. I heard 
the Mauser spit three times spitefully, heard the whir 
of many wings, and looked out on the scene of carnage. 

There were a dozen puffs of feathers afloat on the 
ruffled surface of the lake and there were three lame 
ducks trying to get away. One was swimming in a 
circle ; another, with a broken wing, tried to fly and 
failed to lift its body from the water. We waded out 
and Stimson gathered up the dead while I chased the 
wounded. 

The duck that could neither swim nor fly I caught 
easily, and quickly wrung its neck, but the broken 
winged bird made a rush for deep water at a speed that 
i47 


Castaway Island 

there was no chance for me to equal. “ Shoot him 
again,” I called to Stimson, who was now ashore. 

“ Not a bit ! We want those two cripples alive for 
our poultry yard,” the captain answered. “ Wait ; I 
am coming for them.” 

Then I saw the third wounded bird away down the 
lake and Stimson was running along the shore keep- 
ing abreast of it. As he ran he shed his clothing, wet 
now as it could possibly be, to soak in the rain on the 
beach. I waded ashore and watched him, laughing. 

The crippled duck was getting into the narrow por- 
tion of the lake, keeping far over to the other side. 
Stimson waded out and began to swim toward it qui- 
etly at an angle, to head it off. The duck, seeing his 
head approach, turned and made an effort to fly, but 
it was useless, and it began a return swim up the lake. 
The other lame bird was close to the farther bank 
opposite me. 

For the next fifteen minutes I watched as interesting 
an exhibition of swimming as I ever care to see. Stim- 
son would try to capture first one duck and then the 
other, allowing them to quiet down after each fright. 
He employed strategy, swimming under water much of 
the time, but the ducks seemed to know just where he 
was either above or below, and they could swim twice 
as fast as he. I stood on the shore in the cold rain 
and laughed, although I might have been assisting if 
it had not been such fun. I expected that Stimson 
would give it up and call to me to shoot the cripples, 
148 


In the Nick of Time 


but he had no such idea. With infinite patience he 
would start again his cautious approach of a duck, 
making no useless lunges or splash, giving over his 
attempt so soon as the bird was in full retreat, and 
beginning on the other. 

Part of the time he was in shallow water, and at 
these intervals secured rest for the next attempt. Soon 
I noticed that he was getting nearer the bird before it 
took fright ; and at last I saw him make a dive and 
in a twinkling the duck, with a loud squawk, was 
dragged out of sight. One had been captured by the 
legs. Holding it high in one hand, the captain swam 
and waded to me. 

“ Take this one up to the hut and shut it in,” he 
told me. “ IT1 have the other by the time you get 
back.” 

He was as good as his word, for I passed him run- 
ning to the house with a green-headed drake squawk- 
ing in his hand. “ Pick up my clothes, if you will, 
Bob, and then come in quick. We will build up a fire 
and then look after the wounded. It's the beginning 
of our barn-yard.” 

Very carefully he dressed the broken wings of the 
two mallards, binding them up in linen from one of my 
handkerchiefs, while they quacked and fluttered in 
fright. When the operation was complete, he clipped 
the wings of both of them and took them out to the 
chicken pen, turning them loose within. 

We were so proud of our live stock that we could 
149 


Castaway Island 

not keep away from them long. A half dozen times 
that afternoon one or the other of us went to the coop 
to see that the ducks were still in the sheltered corner. 
We sprinkled dried poi before them and seeds from 
the papaya, but they would not eat. 

“We will begin trapping chickens to-morrow,” de- 
clared Stimson. “ These birds need company. They 
are sore and lonesome. We shall have to find some 
hens to make it seem like a barn-yard.” 

“ But these ducks were never tame? ” I asked. 

“ No. Ducks are just as naturally wild as chickens 
are domestic. The tame mallard is the wild bird do- 
mesticated, while the tame hen never was wild. Do I 
make myself clear ? ” and Stimson assumed the air of 
a college professor. 

“ As clear as mud. Why is a hen ? ” I countered. 

“ Never mind the why, but where is a hen ? Prefer- 
ably a hen and a brood of chicks. I wonder if that 
fowl whose eggs you took, and gave back, has hatched 
yet?” 

“We might go up to the old camp and find out.” 

“ Not in this storm. Comfort Creek is probably 
running torrents and Roaring River is living up to its 
name so hard that you can hear it above the storm. 

% What we will do is to set some snares at the edge of the 
grove where I found signs the other day.” 

We built snares that night out of twisted thread, 
slip nooses that a chicken might place a foot in care- 
lessly and pull taut, and the next morning we arranged 
150 


In the Nick of Time 


them along the branches of the tree which served as a 
roost for the flock. It was a simple contrivance, but 
before the week was over we caught three hens and a 
cockerel in the snares and they were soon quite at 
home, their wings clipped, in our poultry pen. The 
ducks, too, had begun to eat as their wounds healed, 
but they were still much more shy than the chickens, 
and kept in the far corner of the yard when we were by. 

The rain lasted this time for a whole week, and our 
employments were confined greatly to the hut. Even 
the trip to the chicken pen meant soaked clothing and 
the necessity of drying off before the big fire at the back 
of our house. We had no fireplace, but behind the hut 
we had built up rocks in such a manner as to make a 
semicircle that threw back the heat against the wall, 
and here, sheltered by the eaves, we might stand and 
absorb the warmth. It was a discouraging affair start- 
ing a fire in the rain, however, and we promised our- 
selves that there would be an inside fireplace just as 
soon as the weather gave us opportunity to build one. 

I was extremely anxious to go to the old camp, and 
I offered many reasons for undertaking the journey, but 
the captain vetoed them as rapidly as I advanced them. 
I wanted really to get the bundle of books and papers 
that we had taken from the “ Sally ” and which now 
lay, along with much of our salvage from the schooner, 
in the dug-out beside the creek. I did not like to tell 
Stimson that I was aching to read, needed the sight of 
print more than I needed food, as it sounded silly to 

151 


Castaway Island 

me and I feared would seem worse to him. But that 
was the case. These long rainy days had brought back 
my hankering for books and I felt that I would be 
quite happy if I could only have a chance to lie on my 
couch beneath the window with a book and hear the > 
rain pattering on the roof. 

Stimson would not go up the stream for the chickens, 
not even if he believed that the hen had come off with 
her babies ; he would not go for salt pork when our 
supply gave out ; he would not attempt the journey for 
the sake of more powder and shot for the spatter gun ; 
so how could I expect him to go for the matter of some 
old newspapers and novels from the captain’s cabin ? 
That bundle still lay as it had been wrapped up on the 
raft with canvas about it, never as yet opened ; and to 
my imagination it contained all the jewels of Aladdin’s 
cave. I yearned for the printed pages. 

One morning when there was little to do, when we 
had fed the poultry and cleaned up the house, when 
Stimson started to feel around for some new task to 
keep us busy, I spoke my mind. “ I want to read,” 
I said dismally. 

“ And so do I,” was the captain’s unexpected re- 
sponse. “ That is just what I have been yearning for 
without knowing what it was I wanted. What became 
of those books we took off the schooner ? ” 

“ They are up in the dug-out.” 

“ Then we’ll have to get them. Besides, we need 
pork and ammunition. Let’s start right away and we 
152 


In the Nick of Time 


can sleep there in the cellar to-night and come back 
to-morrow. It will be a damp trip, but we are used to 
the wet.” 

It was a damp trip ! Comfort Creek was way out of 
bounds and its name was a misnomer. We were obliged 
to travel the side hills, breaking trail through wet 
underbrush while all the way a deadly dreary rain 
came steadily down upon us. I had wrapped the locks 
of the shotgun in a bit of canvas before leaving and 
this important part of the weapon was the only thing 
dry about us. Our hats dripped water in streams, our 
clothes ran with wet, our boots sogged like pulp. I 
trusted that my tin powder-flask, carried beneath n^ 
coat, was water-proof. At any rate Stimson’s cartridges 
were. We always looked first to our weapons and 
ammunition in this wilderness of ours. 

The way was lengthened and made difficult by the 
rain, our progress hindered. We were a long way 
below the old camp when darkness set in, but there was 
nothing to do but go on. We could not lose our way in 
the ravine with the stream sounding a guiding roar all 
the time, but we stumbled and floundered about, making 
slow headway, bumping into trees and falling over logs. 

Suddenly I heard a call in the night, a long cry in 
the distance, and Stimson, ahead, stopped in his tracks. 
I fell against his back — it was too dark for me to see 
him — and he grasped my arm to keep me from falling. 
“A dog,” he said, answering my unspoken question; 
but he did not go on. “ Hush ! ” he cautioned. 
i53 


Castaway Island 

There was an answering call nearer than the first, 
then another and again, unmistakably the howling of 
dogs. I felt an immediate relief from the fear that had 
clutched my heart in that first wail through the dark. 
Dogs were accustomed animals ; let them howl. 

“ Come, Bob. We must run for it. Keep close 
behind me, and if I go faster than you can make it, 
call me back. But do your best to keep up. There is 
one chance for us, and that is to make the dug-out. 
Now run ! ” The captain's voice gave me graver appre- 
hension than the howling of fifty dogs. 

I ran ; and it was a fearful run, broken by stum- 
blings and collisions and punctuated by the baying of 
dogs growing momentarily louder and nearer. I re- 
membered the look in the eyes of the deer that had 
come down the river's course chased by the dogs and I 
could imagine that my eyes were bulging out and my 
nostrils were aquiver. Every step I took I expected to 
hear the breaking of the brush behind me as the dogs 
came through, and their barking sounded but a few 
rods away. Then I passed Stimson. I saw his tall 
form, a little blacker than the black night, and heard 
him shout, “ Good boy, Bobbin ! Good lad ! We are 
almost there. Keep at it ! ” And I heard him splash- 
ing behind me. 

We were in the glade now, and it was open running. 
I knew the land, knew where I was, found the trail to 
the dug-out and increased my speed. Stimson was 
somewhere behind. I could not see him as I looked 
154 


In the Nick of Time 


back, nor could I hear him, but I knew he was safe. 
Then I heard the crack of the Mauser, and I stopped 
short, jerking with clumsy fingers the canvas from the 
*gun breech. Turning back, I saw the blue spurts of 
flame from the rifle’s muzzle and heard the spit, spit, 
spit of the discharge. I cocked both barrels and 
started back. I must be beside him in the fight. 

“ Run, Bob ! Never mind me ! I’ll be right behind 
you,” the captain called, as though he had guessed my 
intention, for he could not see me. Even in that 
moment a feeling of pride came over me that the cap- 
tain knew that I would not desert him. And I obeyed 
orders. In another moment I was at the post door of 
our cellar, tearing away at the rope that bound it, 
cutting it with my knife ; and I held open the door as 
the captain dashed by and hurled it shut behind him ; 
not tight shut, for there was something between it and 
the casing, something yielding that snarled and howled 
as I put one foot against the logs and threw my weight 
to the closing of the dug-out door. 


155 



CHAPTER XIII 

FIGHTING THE WILD PACK 

S TIMSON snatched a match, holding it above his 
head, and the light revealed the head and paws of 
a yelping dog caught in the jamb. Outside a dozen 
more were hurling themselves against the door, but as 
it opened out, they served only to drive it tighter 
against the unfortunate animal. “ Push it open ! now, 
Bob ! ” shouted Stimson, and before the light went out 
I saw his boot land hard in the face of the brute, and I 
pulled the door tight and fastened it. He had kicked 
him into the mess of his ravenous companions. 

We were both exhausted and panting and we threw 
ourselves down on the pile of supplies to regain our 
breath. For a while there was no sound inside but our 
deep drawn breathing. Then the captain began to 
chuckle. 

“ Fooled the nice little doggies that time,” he said. 
156 


Fighting the Wild Pack 

“ Talk about wolves, Bob ! I’d rather have three packs 
of Russian wolves after me than that band of pirates ! 
Always in the stories when you shoot one wolf the 
'remainder of the pack stop to eat him, and you get a 
chance to put space between. But not these dogs ! 
Not a bit ! They kept right on while I was plugging 
them. Seemed to enjoy it. I wonder what they are 
doing now.” 

“ Probably waiting for us to come out. I’ve seen 
dogs around a rabbit hole for hours. We are the 
rabbits.” 

“ Listen ! ” 

There was a scratching from above. “ Trying to dig 
us out,” declared the captain. 

“ They can’t get through the roof logs if they get 
down to them,” I said confidently. 

“ No, but they can make this place mighty uncom- 
fortable for us by breaking through our roofing. We 
will be in water to our knees if they get holes in that 
sod. We must make a fire here, some kind of a light, 
and stop this.” 

The scratching continued while we gathered together 
dried branches and leaves from the corners of the cave 
and touched a match to them. It was all light stuff 
and made little smoke. Stimson took the shotgun and 
went to the door. “ You are not going out ? ” I asked 
anxiously. 

“ I’m going to look out. Come here, Bob.” 

I went to his side and through a crack in the door 
i57 


Castaway Island 

peered out into the night. It was bright moonlight 
now, and there were stars in the sky. The rain was 
over. “ Hurrah ! ” I shouted, and Stimson gave a 
great shout of joy. 

Before the door, some sitting on their haunches,- 
some gravely trotting back and forth, were a score of 
dogs as big as the largest of collies. At our shout they 
laid back their ears and dashed at the door, some 
bounding hard against it. “ No, I’m not going out, 
even if the weather is fine,” said Stimson. 

“ Doesn’t look healthy out there,” I grinned. 

“ The night air wouldn’t agree with my delicate 
constitution,” rejoined the captain. 

There was a sizzling of our fire that brought us to 
the right-about in a second. A stream of water was 
running upon it from the ceiling. “ That beast has 
made an opening,” said Stimson. “ Now I’ll see if I 
can make one.” 

He poked the gun-barrel through the hole and felt 
it touch soft fur ; then he pulled trigger. The noise 
of the explosion in the small cellar was almost deafen- 
ing. I ran and looked through the crack in the door. 
There was evident consternation in the ranks of the 
sentinels. The scratching at our roof ceased. 

The leak trickled, dripped and stopped. The fire 
blazed up again, and we stood near it, regardless of the 
smoke, and soaked in heat while our clothing steamed. 
There was little smoke to the blaze and the cracks in 
the door gave it egress, so we were not uncomfortable. 

158 


Fighting the Wild Pack 

Now and then Stimson would create a draft by waving 
his hat. 

“ I wonder if the dogs will leave when day comes? ” 
I asked. 

“ They are going sooner than that,” the captain re- 
plied. “ I need sleep, and I can’t sleep with them 
howling around.” 

“ What are you going to do ? ” 

“ Give them the only thing they can’t stand — fire.” 

He searched out the bundle of books and papers 
which we had come through this experience to secure 
and opened it. From it he took four of the newspapers 
and rolled them into torch shape, one end of each torch 
loose and easy to burn, the other end tight rolled to 
hold in the hand. “ Sorry to burn reading matter, but 
it has to be done,” he explained. “ And there is plenty 
more of it. Now to make a bomb that will give us a 
chance with our torches.” 

He took a piece of canvas about the size of a hand- 
kerchief, into which he poured a handful of gunpowder 
from my flask. Then he doubled the canvas about the 
powder, first inserting a fuse made of threads of the 
canvas rubbed in gunpowder. The canvas was rolled 
into the shape of a giant firecracker and was tightly 
bound with string. It was an old-fashioned, home- 
made firecracker and he knew from experience that it 
would give both noise and fire. 

Carefully he explained to me his plan and the part 
each should take in its execution. Upon each of our 
i59 


Castaway Island 

backs was tied a bundle of dry wood. Then he gave 
me a torch for either hand and I stood over the fire 
ready to light them when he gave the word. 

He looked through the door’s crack at the dogs wait- 
ing without, then quietly undid the fastening. The 
fuse of his bomb was lighted, the door opened and the 
bomb hurled into the midst of the pack. As it ex- 
ploded, I pushed my torches into the fire, saw them 
light, and with a blaze in either hand rushed out, with 
Stimson, similarly armed, a moment behind. Right 
into the center of the disorganized pack we ran, thrust- 
ing the fire into their faces. They broke with howls 
and ran. Then I turned to the left and Stimson to the 
right and made for the top of the dug-out. 

It took but a moment to demoralize the remnant of 
the band who were tearing at the roof sods. They fled 
at our blazing approach. In another moment the 
faggots we had carried on our backs were piled and the 
papers, now burned close down to our hands, were 
thrust underneath. We had a bonfire that blazed high 
in the air. 

“ Fine work ! ” cried the captain enthusiastically. 
“ Watch the fire, Bob, while I make a foray after more 
wood. We will pile this up for a big blaze and then 
get to sleep. I think the dogs have learned their 
lesson.” 

There was no more trouble from them that night, 
and we both slept for a few hours when our clothes 
dried. Soon after sunrise all traces of the week’s 
160 


Fighting the Wild Pack 

steady rain had disappeared, vaporized by the tropic 
heat, and we started back for the grove with the books 
and the remainder of the papers. They were stowed 
away beneath my couch, unopened, for there was 
plenty to do while the sun shone and no time to read. 
First a fireplace, that would give heat and cheer to the 
hut ; and we began it at once. 

It was ' no trouble to find stone for the chimney. 
There was a variety of rocks along the shore of the 
lake and we gathered enough in a day for our con- 
struction. But mortar was not so easy. Stimson 
hunted up and down the creek for a clay bank with- 
out success and decided that we must make the best of 
just mud. Then began a series of mud pie experi- 
ments with dirt from the shore, dirt from the grove 
and dirt from along the spring. Small round pats 
were made, just like the little girls used to make pies 
out of dirt and water, and allowed to dry. Then their 
tenacity was decided in the breaking of them. 

None of these had sufficient holding qualities to satisfy 
the captain, and he went farther afield for dirt. On 
the side of the mountain he discovered red earth ; from 
across the lake he brought brown earth ; from the 
bottom of Bamboo Swamp he dug green earth, and this 
was what we needed. It dried hard like cement and 
Stimson announced himself as more than satisfied. 
Next morning we became stone masons. 

In that wonderful head of his the captain carried 
the rules and proportions of a fireplace, for fireplaces 
161 


Castaway Island 

are delicate matters of rules and proportions, or else 
they are matters of smoke and annoyance. The area 
of the front opening should be ten times the area of 
the chimney. The throat must be the same area as 
the flue. And the captain directed and we both built, 
stone above stone, until one evening we found that our 
chimney was above the peak of the house and ready to 
finish off with a final leveling row of stone. Then 
came the trial fire, the test of our workmanship. The 
kindling caught, the flame darted up and forward, 
then curved back to the throat. The smoke arose up 
the chimney, poured out at its top. The draught was 
perfect, the fireplace done. 

It had been a week’s work of long hours, but I had 
learned to enjoy work and could stand long hours 
without undue fatigue. For me these days were the 
happiest I had known, for the island was becoming my 
home in truth, and all my interests were bound up in 
it. The hut, the poultry yard, the lake and orchard, 
they seemed now the greatest part of life to me, and I 
would not have exchanged our possessions for all that 
the city of my birth could offer. 

Since the night when Stimson, too, had heard the 
sound of feet on the far shore of the lake, he had never 
spoken of it and I knew that he did not wish me to 
broach the subject. Several times I had seen him 
tilt his ear toward the ground, listening intently, 
but we had never heard it again, and it was almost 
forgotten by me. And there had been nothing else 
162 


Fighting the Wild Pack 

to give us a fear or hope of human habitation of the 
island. 

One morning when the rain had made a pause in its 
almost continuous dripping or pouring, Stimson 
suggested that we climb the mountain behind Roaring 
River and take a look through the glasses at the sea 
and glimpse the flag again on Signal Hill. I was 
surprised to find how little interest I had in the chance 
coming of a ship or our distress signal, but the oppor- 
tunity of seeing more of the country which was all 
ours made me eagerly second the proposal, and we 
were shortly on our way with a lunch strapped to 
Stimson's back and the guns on our shoulders. 

I was following behind the captain when I no- 
ticed for the first time what a ragged condition 
his clothes were in. “ Captain/' I cried, “ you're 
quite as bad as you were that first day I met you in 
Guayaquil." 

“ Bad ? " He stopped short, looking around at me in 
inquiry. 

“ In your costume," I explained, laughing. “ You 
are back in the Rag-bag Battalion." 

He glanced down at such part of his apparel as he 
could see, then looked me over quizzically. “Well, 
Bob," he said, “ you're hardly in a position, sartorially 
speaking, to criticize. You need a visit to the tailor 
yourself. If I ran across you on a city street I'd shout 
for the police." 

“ I know ; and my shoes are so thin in the soles that 
163 


Castaway Island 

I might as well be barefoot. It must be about time we 
took to the dogskins.” 

“ We’ll take to the needle just as soon as we get 
'.back,” Stimson promised. “ Clothing and shoes are 
the next requirement of our advanced civilization, and 
you and I become tailors, Bob. It just happens that 
there is cloth in plenty growing back of the hut.” 

“ Cloth ? ” I gasped. “ Growing ? ” 

“ Mulberry trees — the paper mulberry, which is tapa 
cloth, properly prepared. For shoes, moccasins of 
deerhide or dogskin — take your choice. We’ll get at 
it to-morrow,” and Stimson resumed his climb of the 
mountain. 

When we broke through the edge of the forest at the 
timber-line the sun was shining brightly. These 
rainy-season days, when they were bright, were almost 
perfect, for the heat of the sun was tempered by the 
moisture in the air and it was neither cool nor hot. 
Happily we climbed the last half mile to the summit, 
where Stimson began a long survey of the horizon 
with his glasses and I studied the near-by landscape 
below. 

To the southwest was a bank of fog or rain-cloud 
which shut off my view. I watched it as the wind 
shifted it back and forth, then looked more intently. 
“ Captain,” I said, “ will you turn your glasses yonder 
and tell me what those specks are ? ” 

“Just a minute, Bob.” Stimson had the binoculars 
focused on the sea line in the east. Now he lowered 
164 


Fighting the Wild Pack 

them and turned to me. “Where away, lad?” he 
asked. 

“ In the fog-belt now,” I laughed. “ A minute ago 
I saw specks that seemed to move.” I pointed to the 
gray cloud. 

He handed me the glasses. “ See if you can pene- 
trate it,” he said. “ My eyes are tired.” 

The powerful lenses only served to bring the gray 
cloud nearer and I was just about to give it up as an 
illusion of the fog, when a whiff of breeze lifted it for 
a moment and again I saw moving spots spattered ir- 
regularly over the slope. What they were I could not 
tell, for even with the glasses the distance was too great 
to give them shape and form, but they were animals of 
some kind, alive and moving. 

I thrust the binoculars into Stimson’s hand. 
“ Look ! ” I cried. “ It is something — something that 
moves quickly — animals that run ! ” 

“ If I were in Wyoming,” Stimson said, after a long 
survey, “ I should know just what to call those 
specks.” 

“What would they be in Wyoming?” I asked 
eagerly. 

“ Horses. They move like horses, group like horses, 
graze like horses. Bob, you don’t think we are going 
to find a horse ranch here, too ? ” 

“ I don’t know why not,” I replied, eagerly. “ We 
have chickens and dogs ; horses wouldn’t be any more 
strange.” 


165 


Castaway Island 

“ Strange or not, that is what they are,” said 
Stimson, lowering the glass. “ Jiminetty ! Look 
there ! ” and he pointed to a much closer hillside out 
in the sunlight where a small band of ponies trotted 
into view. There were six of them, scraggly little 
beasts with long manes and tails, and they were follow- 
ing a black stallion who led them down the slope 
toward the river. They passed a half mile below us, 
and we watched them till they entered the wood to the 
north. 

“ Bob,” said Stimson slowly, “ this island is a great 
barn-yard of wild domestic animals. Some time or 
other it was inhabited by people who knew what to 
plant and what to raise in the way of live stock, and 
that is the meaning of the horses and dogs, coffee and 
cocoa trees, the poultry, sugar cane and tobacco. You 
haven’t a kitten concealed about you, Bob? ” 

“ No,” I laughed. “ I haven’t seen any wild 
kittens.” 

“ We’ll find them. All the comforts of home, 
Bobbin, so let’s get back and construct a horse trap.” 

“ How does one trap horses ? ” 

“ Usually with a lariat or lasso on another horse, 
but we haven’t the other horse, Bob. We have to get 
number one, and I have an idea of a corral with a fall- 
ing gate that will drop when a trigger is sprung, a sort 
of figure-four trap. Ever catch bunnies in a figure- 
four?” 

I had tried it one time in the country and I knew 
1 66 


Fighting the Wild Pack 

how the trap should work, but the size necessary for a 
horse trap was appalling, although it did not seem to 
bother Stimson at all. He led the way down the 
'’mountain, crossing Roaring River some distance above 
its confluence with Comfort Creek, and we made a 
search for the place where the horses had watered. 
Soon we found a winding trail down the bluff bank, 
worn deep by the hoofs of many horses, and following 
back came to a little flat which the captain said would 
serve. 

After our noonday meal we went to Bamboo Swamp 
and gathered a hundred or more long canes, about the 
size of my wrist at their butts. Piling them in the 
water at the lake’s end we bound them together into a 
raft, which we easily poled down the lake and creek and 
banked close to the selected flat. It was the lightest 
work in transportation I had done, for I rode on the 
load. 

Stimson selected two trees that grew close together 
as his gateway and these he trimmed on their facing 
sides so that they paralleled for fifteen feet from the 
ground. It gave him posts for his falling gate, posts 
that were firmly planted and would stand the shock. 
While I, under his direction, built a bamboo gate, 
weaving the tall canes across bars of bamboo and 
tying each junction with rattan withes, soaked in 
water, he constructed a corral of circular shape about 
fifty feet in diameter. 

That afternoon and all next day we worked on the 
167 


Castaway Island 

horse trap, and I wondered what the shaggy little 
animals were doing for water, for none came that way, 
even though we took precautions to be elsewhere at 
the time when they had watered before. We set such 
posts as were necessary, digging holes with bamboo 
spades, and we used trees for posts wherever we could, 
weaving bamboo shoots into a high, strong fence that 
could not be easily broken. In the center of the corral 
a post was set for the trigger, a crosspiece lashed loosely 
to it holding the bait. From a notch in the crosspiece 
to a notch in the upright ran a three-foot piece of wood, 
completing the figure four, and to the center of this strip 
a rope ran over a branch of one of the gate-post trees, 
then down to the gate in the grooves. When it was all 
finished, we baited the trigger with a bundle of grass 
and a bunch of plantains, pulled the gate up high in 
its grooves by the rope, fitted the stick into the notches, 
and tried it out. 

Stimson played the part of a hungry horse and 
found that he needed to be extremely voracious before 
he could be caught. He pulled the grass completely 
off the trigger without springing it and had to shake 
hard at the plantains before it snapped, letting down 
the gate with a bang. The stick at the end of the 
rope flew through the air, almost hitting me as I was 
doubled up with laughter at Stimson’s efforts. 

He eased off the pull of the trigger, reset it and sprung 
it again, this time much more easily ; and we reset it 
and left it, after sprinkling plantains and mummy 
1 68 


Fighting the Wild Pack 

apples within the corral and from the gate to the traiL 
It was the best we could do for bait, as we could only 
guess what would please the palates of these mountain 
horses. “ I know they will eat plantains," said Stim- 
son, as we carried the tools back home, “ and they 
should favor any kind of apples. Anyway, we'll give 
it a try." 

It rained again that night ; in fact, it was misting 
during all our afternoon at the trap ; but a big storm 
set in late in the evening, with a high wind from the 
southwest, indicating several days of wet weather. It 
kept me awake for several hours, for our hut was not 
built with any great degree of rigidity and under the 
squalls of wind creaked and groaned sadly. When I 
did get to sleep I slept lightly and was brought wide 
awake by the sound of footsteps I had heard twice 
before, coming to my ear through the medium of the 
ground. I awoke Stimson at once. “ They're coming 
again," I explained in a whisper. 

They were coming this time, for the sound became 
more distinct even as we listened, ears to ground. 
Stimson took the rifle and started for the door. “ Wait 
here," he commanded, but for once I rebelled. 

“ I'm bringing the spatter gun," I said, “ and I'm 
going to be right behind you." 

“ Very well, Bob." He opened the door, holding it 
hard against the wind. “ Come on. I don't know 
what we are going to find or what we can see should 
we find anything in this blackness, but what that noise 
169 


Castaway Island 

is I want to know. Follow me closely, Bob,” and he 
pushed out into the storm. 

I could just see him, and I was so close behind him 
that sometimes my toes touched his heels. When we 
reached the lake’s beach, it seemed a trifle lighter or 
else we were becoming used to the dark, for he was 
silhouetted like a black shadow against a lighter back- 
ground. Slowly we moved down the shore, stopping 
every few steps to listen. Even above the roar of the 
storm we could hear the plod, plod, plod of the march- 
ing feet, and now we could locate them, coming from 
the forest at the east end of the grove, moving toward 
the lake. Our ears told us they were coming ; we 
could see nothing. 

Stimson stopped in a patch of brush at the lake’s 
edge and I drew close beside him. With my hand over 
the locks of the gun to keep the rain which soaked me 
from the caps, I pushed the muzzle out through the 
screen, as he had done with the rifle. Then I saw the 
advantage he had gained by taking our position. 
Between us and the forest, from which came the sound 
of footfalls, was a stretch of yellow beach, enough 
lighter than the black foliage in the night that any 
one passing across it must be visible to us while we 
were unseen. 

The captain placed his lips close to my ear. “ Do 
not fire until I fire, then shoot to kill,” he commanded 
in a whisper. 

170 



CHAPTER XIV 
THE GREAT TURTLES 

S TEADILY coming ever nearer, the slow moving 
sound of marching feet grew louder and more dis- 
tinct and our eyes ached in endeavor to pierce the 
blackness of night and storm. Long after our ears told 
us we should be able to perceive the intruders, so close 
was the sound, nothing was visible. Then, suddenly, 
there was a shadow on the line of the beach where it 
met the wood, and I felt Stimson’s muscles stiffen. I 
was trembling with the tension and excitement. 
Thirty long seconds, measured by heart-beats, and into 
our view came the queerest procession I ever expect to 
see. 

Marching in Indian file, close behind each other, 
came great turtles, one after another, like inverted 
bath-tubs on moving legs. Slowly they marched, 
keeping step as though drilled, until there were sixty 
171 


Castaway Island 

or more, pacing gravely away down the shore of the 
lake. Their heads, like snakeheads, at the end of long 
necks nodded and peered, high above the enormous 
shells, some of which must have been five feet long ; 
and the legs, crooked but muscular, carried the great* 
shells at a height of a foot from the ground. 

“ Jiminetty ! ” muttered Stimson, following them 
with his eyes, and I could not but do likewise, so 
weird and grotesque was this procession of impossible 
animals. It seemed like a bad dream, and I shook 
myself to find if I was really awake. When they had 
vanished into the darkness, we still waited, hearing 
their feet on the sands, until the sound diminished and 
was lost in the storm. 

“ The galapagos,” said Stimson, stepping out from 
our ambush, and his eyes still followed the way they 
had gone. “ Bob, I never expected to see such a thing 
in this world. Come on home,” and he grasped my 
hand and led me, running through the storm, to the hut. 

Before the fireplace, heaped up with lightwood to 
make hot flame, we dried our rags and I shivered 
at the memory of that sight. “ I hate them ! ” I ex- 
claimed. “ Their heads are snaky, wagging, craning, 
as though they saw all things ! They look like the 
pictures of animals that lived in prehistoric times, be- 
fore there were men.” 

“ They are — just that,” declared the captain. “ They 
are the last of the Pleocenes, and their kind has dis- 
appeared from all the earth except here. In no other 
172 


The Great Turtles 


place could you have seen what we saw to-night, and 
these islands are named from them, Bob.” 

“ I should prefer panthers or jaguars,” I said, shud- 
- dering. 

“ No,” laughed Stimson. “ We needn’t be afraid of 
one of these reptiles leaping on us from a tree branch 
or swooping down from a high rock to sink its claws 
into us. Besides, they are remarkably fine eating, 
caught young.” 

“ Young ? Are they ever young ? ” 

“ I suppose a galapago under a hundred years of age 
might be termed youthful, although there is consider- 
able question about the length of life of tortoises. Many 
a practical joker has whittled a date a century before 
he was born on a turtle’s shell and grinned at the 
simple trick to fool the scientists. We’ll experiment 
with them as food some day, Bob.” 

I could not imagine myself ever eating one of the 
snaky beasts, and went to sleep to have nightmares of 
enormous turtles, like elephants, crushing me beneath 
their feet. 

When I awoke in the morning the storm was still 
violent and after breakfast was eaten and cleared away, 
Stimson suggested we see what was in the package of 
^ books we had brought from the dug-out. The very 
thought of getting into the bundle set my heart beating 
and eagerly I pulled it from under my bunk. 

“ What book would you best like to find, Captain ? ” 
I asked as I placed the package on the table between us. 

173 


Castaway Island 

“ That is a hard question. You mean if there were 
only one book in there, which I should prefer ? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ I’d take the Bible. For steady reading it has more 
in it than any book I know. Gives you a better 
philosophy and nobler thoughts and it teaches you a 
lot you won’t get anywhere else. Then, too, I like its 
stories and its history. It’s a grand old book, the 
Bible ! ” 

I had never heard Stimson express himself on any 
religious matter and had the impression that he was 
not a religious man. True, he had always observed 
the days marked with a cross on my page of the log- 
book that served as our calendar, but so mildly that it 
had hardly been noticeable. We did not continue our 
labors on Sunday, if we were house-building or con- 
structing fireplaces, but we did the necessary work of 
the day ; we never hunted or fished on Sunday, but he 
would carry the rifle if we wandered in the woods. I 
knew that he never prayed aloud just as I knew he 
never used profanity or any oath more dangerous than 
“ Jiminetty,” but I was to find out that day, and on 
other days which followed, that he was a serious and 
deep thinking student of the Gospels and one whose God 
was real to him. There was a Bible in the bundle 
and we talked as we read from it and he showed me 
that its truths were vital and every-day matters to be, 
used by us in our daily lives. 

There were five books in the package — four and the 
i74 


The Great Turtles 


Bible ; Shakespeare’s Complete Works, Robert Burns’ 
Poems, “ Charles O’Malley, the Irish Dragoon,” and 
“ Midshipman Easy,” and all that day we had an orgy 
of reading. Neither Stimson nor I wanted food ; barely 
we put aside our books long enough to attend the 
poultry, feeding and watering them, and we forewent 
the daily trip to the chicken snares and quite forgot 
to wonder if the horse trap was sprung. We were 
famished for reading and like gluttons seized the op- 
portunity to make up for our abstemiousness. Late 
that night we kept feeding the chimney with light- 
wood to give us opportunity to finish our books. 

“This won’t do,” laughed Stimson, finally, closing 
his book, which was “ Charles O’Malley.” I had 
“ Midshipman Easy.” “ We mustn’t gulp these books 
down like this, or we’ll be starving again in a day or 
two. Suppose we be reasonable, Bob.” 

“ Let me finish this chapter, please.” 

“ Of course,” said the captain and remained quiet 
until I had grudgingly placed a marker between the 
pages and closed the book. “ We have read almost 
continuously for sixteen hours, Bob.” 

“ I know, but it’s making up for a long famine.” I 
yawned and rubbed tired eyes. 

“ Men who make up a famine in one feed usually are 
ill from the effects,” continued Stimson. “ I’ll make 
an agreement with you, Bob, limiting our reading to 
an hour a day bright days and four on wet days. Is 
it a go ? ” 


i75 


Castaway Island 

I glanced at “ Midshipman Easy ” ; four hours would 
just about finish him. “ It’s a go,” I answered. 

“ Then let’s eat a bite and get to our bunks. To- 
morrow we must begin cloth making.” 

“ And we must look at our trap. I wonder if we’ve 
caught a horse.” Again I was back to the interests of 
our island life. 

In the morning the persistent patter of the rain on 
the nipa leaves gave promise of plenty of opportunity 
for reading, but we made a trip to the horse trap to 
find it unsprung and the bait untouched, although 
there were signs that the horses had passed by on the 
trail. In the snare were two guans and a hen, which 
we added to our poultry house after clipping their 
wings. Stimson was dubious about domesticating the 
pheasants, fearing they would not take kindly to a 
cage, but decided to make the attempt, as they were 
beautiful birds, and would be a great addition to our 
feathered pets. 

We had one hen setting with thirteen eggs beneath 
her, and she was almost due to bring a family into 
existence, the first in captivity. Our lady duck, too, 
was indicating a desire to stay by her nest and we gave 
her three of her own eggs and four hen’s eggs, not 
having enough of the former to absorb her time. All 
our birds were growing tamer each day and seemed to 
thrive on domestication. 

Stimson took me with him to find the paper-mulberry 
tree, a small shrub-like tree with large, hairy leaves, and 
176 


The Great Turtles 


we stripped bark off several of the trunks, only on one 
side to prevent killing them, salving the wounds with 
mud. Only the inner bark was to be used in the 
manufacture of cloth, and we carried our harvest to 
the lake side, sinking it under water with heavy stones. 
“ It isn't to be made in a day," explained the captain. 
“ The bark has to soak to a pulp before it begins to be 
tapa. In the meantime, we will become cobblers." 

That was drier and pleasanter work, for we could be 
in the hut sheltered from the storm. Stimson marked 
out the contour of my foot on one of the dogskins we 
had cured, then quickly cut with his sharp knife a 
shape that resembled a shoe as little as anything else. 
I could only laugh at its grotesque proportions, though 
I knew from experience that the captain was not wast- 
ing dog-hide for nothing. 

“ Now put your foot where it was before," said Stim- 
son, and he began bending the soft leather up and 
around my instep, and strangely enough, it took the 
shape of a high slipper, reaching well above the ankle. 
At the front, where the tongue of a laced shoe would be, 
two folds and a thong of the same leather bound the 
shoe in tight so that it fitted me well and was soft and 
comfortable. 

“ Not so good as a Cheyenne Indian would make up 
in Wyoming," Stimson remarked, surveying it, “ but 
better than your worn-out boots. I'll double-sole it 
and water-proof it with hot grease, and you’ll have dry 
socks hereafter." 


177 


Castaway Island 

“ It's a moccasin ? ” I asked and Stimson nodded. 

“ The winter moccasin of the Cheyennes,” he said, 
“ with the fur on the inside to keep your feet warm. 
The Siwashes call them muck-lucks.” 

He made a pair for each of us, and I marveled at 
their simplicity, for there was but one piece in each 
shoe ; then he built caps for us from the rest of the 
hide, caps with visors and eaves behind to shed the 
rain from face and shoulders. Then he patched the 
worst rents in our clothes, for it must be a week or more 
before he could make tapa out of the mulberry bark. 
We were so busy that day that I had almost forgotten 
“ Midshipman Easy ” and, although it was a rainy, 
four-hour day, I read but a chapter. 

Next morning I went alone to the trap to find it un- 
sprung, though some of the plantains had been eaten 
before its gate. The fourth morning it was raining 
hard and neither of us went. “ We’ll have to make it 
to-morrow, rain or shine,” Stimson declared that night 
as we climbed into our beds. 

It cleared during the night, and we awoke to a 
bright sun that was rapidly sucking up the surplusage 
of moisture, and after breakfast we gathered new bait 
and started for the trap. In my eagerness I ran on 
ahead to where I could see the gate between the two 
trees. It was down. 

At my call of “ Trap sprung ! ” the captain came up 
at a run and we looked eagerly through the openings 
in the corral wall. Sure enough, there was the brown 
178 


The Great Turtles 


side of some large animal within. “ We’ve got one ! 99 
I said, excitedly. 

“ But that isn’t a horse,” declared the captain, find- 
ing a better position to view the interior. “ Jiminetty, 
Bob I We’ve caught a cow ! ” 

We had — a cow and a calf! a big, brown cow and a 
clumsy, awkward legged red calf. The cow was 
endeavoring to find an opening through which she 
might pry a way out with her strong horns, but the 
calf was composedly nibbling a plantain and watched 
us without fear. 

“ Run, Bob,” cried the captain, “ go back to the hut 
for a rope, and run for it ! I’ll have to lash the beastie 
or she’ll break down our fence. What luck ! ” and I 
sped away for a lariat while Stimson watched and pro- 
tected the corral from annihilation. 

The captain made a running noose in the end of the 
halliard I brought him, then climbed to the top of the 
gate, coiling the rope on his arm. From this position 
of vantage overlooking the corral, he awaited his 
opportunity, and when the cow had withdrawn from 
the fence, frightened away by my shouts, he tossed the 
noose so adroitly that it caught over horns and one 
leg. In another moment the cow had thrown herself, 
and Stimson, jumping to the ground, hog-tied her with 
the rest of the rope. 

Hobbled fore and aft, the cow was led back, protest- 
ing but helpless, to the hut, and the calf followed 
meekly. We set to work to build a shed to house 
179 


Castaway Island 

them and finished a rough bamboo affair with a nipa 
leaf roof that afternoon. The next day Stimson milked 
our cow, a delicate operation led up to by a gradual 
acquaintance and friendship with the animal. 

“ In Wyoming,” said Stimson, as he was attempting 
to win a kindly look from the cow with an offered 
plantain, “ I’ve lashed and milked a cow cut out of the 
herd in a half hour, but that is too rough work for our 
lady here. So, bossy ! so ! We’re going to treat you 
gently, bossy, very gently, because we want you to like 
us and give us lots of milk. Why, Bob, think of it ! 
Real milk ! ” 

I did think of it — milk in my coffee, milk in the 
batter-cakes, milk in my big, tin cup ; but I did not 
have milk that day. Stimson milked the cow, but the 
cow managed a hobbled kick with its two rear legs 
which lifted pail and milker through the open front of 
the shed. Stimson was not damaged at all, but the pail 
landed bottom up and my dreams vanished in a 
minute. 

But there was milk for us next day and the calf 
began to seek sustenance from grass and plantains 
while we luxuriated in cream and bananas, berries with 
cream, poi and cream, and the hundreds of good things 
that milk improved or made possible. Stimson, never 
satisfied until he had achieved all the betterments, 
built a churn from a section of bamboo, and I worked 
the dasher until butter came. We already had salt, 
evaporated from sea water, so Stimson worked up a 
180 


The Great Turtles 


roll of salt butter that any farmer’s housewife might be 
proud to acknowledge. 

Although we had rebaited the horse trap and made 
calls on it at intervals that became gradually less 
frequent, there was no second thrill of excitement at 
finding it sprung, and we learned that the horses had 
abandoned the trail beside it. Stimson said they were 
too wary to be caught that way, and began planning 
other means for capturing one or more. Never after 
seeing the horses on the hill was he satisfied to walk ; 
he had been cowboy and soldier too long to travel on 
his own legs when there were equine legs to be had. 

A pitfall was our next endeavor, and it was dug in 
the trail which the ponies had substituted for the old 
one by the corral, a hole about ten feet square, not so 
deep as it should have been, owing to the fact that we 
ran into bed-rock six feet below the top soil and could 
not go deeper without blasting, and gunpowder was too 
precious for that. So we built up the sides with 
bamboo, so they would not offer any purchase for a leap, 
and we covered it over with bamboos, leaves and dirt, 
carefully concealing it with a top dressing that imitated 
the surrounding ground. 

We were not to approach this trap at all after it was 
finished, for Stimson believed the horses smelled us 
out, and we inspected it through the glasses from the 
side hill. But the horses promptly changed their route 
to water and never came near the hidden hole. 

It was just after we had completed the deadfall that 
1S1 


Castaway Island 

Stimson began tapa making. The mulberry bark, 
soaked until it was pulp, was hammered with wooden 
mauls upon a large stone into sheets of fairly thin, 
fairly even, paper-like cloth. When it was thoroughly 
dried, it made a coarse, yellow-brown fabric somewhat 
like burlaps, but resisted water much better than our 
ragged, woolen clothes. 

So a month went by, marked off day by day in the 
log-book by a line or cross, and with it passed the 
rainy season and came the calm, tropic days, the hun- 
dreds of varieties of birds, bands of chattering mon- 
keys and shrieking parrots. I greeted the return of 
summer with joy, for I had read through all the books 
and newspapers to the smallest advertisement in the 
oldest newspaper in the bundle. Many of Burns’ 
poems I knew by heart. 

All of our talk now was of the circumnavigation of 
the island. We had planned it for weeks and had 
accumulated the supplies necessary for the cruise. 
Stimson anticipated a week at least on sea, with land 
expeditions that would double the time. We could 
safely leave our live stock now, as the fowls were al- 
lowed liberty during the day and sought the coop at 
dusk of their own free will, and could provide for 
themselves and their broods of chicks and ducklings. 
The calf, thoroughly weaned, and its mother, now dry, 
made pasture in the grove and we had no fear of their 
wandering back into wildness. 

We rebuilt the “ Cozy Cask ” completely, and it was 
182 


The Great Turtles 


a better sailing craft than it had ever been before. 
The hatches which were its deck had great bamboos 
to support them in place of the oil barrels, and I sug- 
gested that we rename it the “ Rollicking Catamaran.” 
It could sail much closer into the wind than before 
and Stimson had supplied a rigging of leg-of-mutton 
sails, easily handled and better adapted to our needs. 


183 



CHAPTER XV 

MY HEEL FINDS AN OYSTER 

I T was daybreak one morning when we shoved the 
“ Cozy Cask ” out through the light surf, hoisted 
the sails and caught a northeast breeze that wafted us 
gently on our way for a westward run past Signal 
Point. From its staff our flag still floated, tattered 
and frayed by the winds, looking more than ever a 
signal of distress. Stimson, at the steering oar, bowed 
to it gravely. “ Thank you,” he said. “ You've 
worked all winter, and it is not your fault that you 
have accomplished nothing. Keep at it, flag.” 

184 


My Heel Finds an Oyster 

“ I don’t care whether it keeps at it or not,” I said* 
happily, lying in the shade of the sail. “This suits 
me pretty well, Captain.” 

“Contented?” he asked. 

“ Perfectly. Aren’t you ? ” 

Stimson only smiled in reply, but I went on to 
enumerate my reasons for contentment. “ Haven’t 
we about everything we could ask for?” I cried. 
“ House, barn and farm, the best of food and sufficient 
clothes, a whole island all our own to explore and dis- 
cover new things for our uses. I think I have a right 
to be contented, Captain.” 

Again he made no reply, and I wondered for the 
first time if he shared with me all the happiness of 
this strange adventure. He always seemed so con- 
tented that I had never had another idea of it, believ- 
ing him as ready as was I to be a permanent castaway. 
I would have asked him the question pointblank, but 
he called me to take the helm .while he swung the 
sails to make the turn down the coast for our run 
southward along the island’s western shore. 

A current setting in shoreward kept us busy navi- 
gating the raft, but it added a couple of knots speed 
to our progress past the upper coast, a barren and un- 
interesting stretch of high bluffs, and we were glad to 
have the advantage. It was well on in the afternoon 
before there came a change in the coast line, a break 
in the cliffs that evidenced a bay or inlet, and Stimson 
put the raft’s nose in through the narrow opening. 

185 


Castaway Island 

It was a tiny bay behind the headlands, calm as our 
own little lake, with a beach that rose gently to the 
edge of a forest. Here the trees were larger and more 
hardy, many cypresses and pines, and from one of 
these, standing alone on the point of rock which 
marked its southern end, we named the bay. The 
scraggly tree gave the idea by its shape ; Ostrich Bay 
we called it, even before we had left the raft. 

We dropped anchor in shallow water beyond the 
surf line and we waded ashore. I had taken but a 
few steps landward when I gave a cry of pain. “ What 
is it, Bob?” cried Stimson, plowing through the water 
to my side. 

“ Cut myself,” I answered, laughing at my own yell 
of pain. 

“ Cut yourself? Where?” 

I tried to hold my foot above water, but it was too 
deep. “ Stepped on something,” I explained. “ It cut 
like a knife.” 

“ Let me see,” and Stimson lifted me in strong arms. 
“ Which foot ? ” 

I kicked it out. Across the heel was a long, deep 
gash which bled profusely. 

“ Jiminetty ! ” ejacuated Stimson, starting shoreward 
with me in his arms. “ Now what do you think could 
do that ? ” 

After binding up the wound he waded back to dis- 
cover, hunting with his hand in the three feet of water, 
his head stretched back to keep his nose above the 
1 86 


4 


My Heel Finds an Oyster 

surface. In a few minutes of groping about the bottom, 
he straightened up, holding high the half of a shell. 

“ There is the aggressor, Bob,” he said, throwing it 
^ashore. “ That was once an oyster.” 

I picked it up, looking with admiring eyes at the 
iridescent interior while Stimson searched for live 
oysters. In a short time he found a bunch of them 
and broke them away from the bottom rock. “ These,” 
he said, as he joined me ashore, “ will pay the penalty 
for their dead relative's assault on you, and the penalty 
shall be fried oysters. Does that sound good to you, 
Bob?” 

“ Do oyster shells all have this beautiful interior ? ” 
I asked, hobbling behind him up the shingle. Stimson 
turned quickly, taking the shell I held out. 

“ All ? Not much they don’t I That's mother of 
pearl, Bob. These must be pearl oysters,” and he began 
forcing open the shells with his heavy knife, eagerly 
searching the bivalves within. 

I sat down and laughed at his earnestness. “ You're 
throwing away the only valuable part of those pearl 
oysters,” I said. “ We could eat the meat of them.” 

“ Right you are, Bobbin, but let me have my excite- 
ment. Pearls, lad — think of it ! A fortune, perhaps, 
right out in that little bay ! I am going out there and 
bring back a sack of them.” 

“ And I'll build a fire to fry them on,” I returned, 
“ and get ready a pot of coffee to wash them down. 
Never mind pearls, Captain, so long as you bring back 
187 


Castaway Island 

oysters.” But Stimson was wading out to the oyster 
beds. 

I watched him as I gathered wood for the fire. He 
was working out into deeper water, diving down every 
few seconds to bring back the shells which he placed 
in a canvas strapped about his neck. I had the fire 
burning with the coffee over it and he was still fishing. 

I walked down to the edge of the sea, and sat there 
smiling to myself at his efforts. The sun was getting 
low and sent a shaft of bright color across the bay, 
making a silhouette of Stimson’s head and shoulders. 
Then I saw a second silhouette and simultaneously I 
yelled. It was the fin of a shark between him and me, 
and his back was toward it. 

Just in time, Stimson turned, saw and dodged. 
There was the surge of white spume as the great fish 
whirled at him, passed him, and Stimson ran for shore. 
I saw three black fins against the sun behind him, but 
the water was shallow and they did not follow in. 

“ Thank you,” said the captain, shaking the water 
from him and dropping the bag of bivalves. “ You 
yelled just in time, Bob. Til carry my knife next 
trip.” 

“ You're not going back ? ” I asked anxiously. It 
had been a greater shock to me than to him, this nar- 
row escape of his. 

“ We’ll see when we’ve opened these oysters. If 
there are pearls, I’ll not let a fish or so scare me away 
from them. It’s a chance at a fortune, Bob.” 

188 



I HAD THE FIRE BURNING 


















' 


. 


















































































* 



















My Heel Finds an Oyster 

He had brought in twoscore or more, and in only one 
was there a pearl. That was so small that Stimson 
called it a seed pearl, but it encouraged him to decide 
to spend a day longer there and seek further. “ It 
hardly seems worth risking sharks' bites for," he said, 
as I put the oysters in the frying-pan, salted them 
and heard them begin to sizzle ; “ but where one is, 
there may be more and quite likely bigger. If you're 
willing, we'll spend a day here seeing what we have 
found." 

I was quite willing. That little white globule, no 
bigger than a bird-shot, had stirred up my adventurous 
blood and I was willing to risk sharks and drowning 
to get more. We ate supper, discussing the chances 
of success, and we stretched out in our blankets after- 
ward, still talking of pearls and their values. The 
moon came up full behind the forest and cast a light 
on the surface of the bay, making it luminous. 

“ The oyster beds run out," Stimson explained. 
“ We struck at the shore end of them, and the bigger 
oysters will be in the deeper water. We'll have to 
dive for them, Bob." 

“ I don’t like the idea of diving into a possible 
shark," I said. 

“ No, we are not going to take any such chance. 
I'll dive and you will keep a watch out for big fish. 
We'll work from the raft, and we ought to have half a 
ton of shell by to-morrow night." 

“ And do we have to open a thousand pounds of 
189 


Castaway Island 

oysters ? ” I asked, for it had not been an easy job to 
pry out a half hundred. 

“ We’ll open just enough to see if there’s a hope, 
then pile the rest on shore here to rot open. We can 
come back here in a month and we’ll find them ready * 
for us. That’s the method, I believe, although I do 
not know as much about pearl fishing as I wish I did. 
It never struck me that I’d ever own a pearl oyster 
bed.” 

I was silent for some time. “ Isn’t it strange, Cap- 
tain,” I said at last, “ that it comes to you when it is 
no use at all ? Pearls are valueless here.” 

“ Not worth one stalk of bamboo,” admitted Stimson, 

“ but they have some use for them up in the States, 

I expect, and I still have a hope of revisiting those 
parts.” 

“ Do you want to leave here ? ” I asked the question 
that was close to my heart. 

Stimson took time to answer. “ I am not discontented 
here, Bob, don’t think that, but I should not like to 
think I am going to be here all the rest of my life. I 
have a hankering, more or less, for civilization, and 
then, too, I feel a responsibility for your education and 
development. How old are you, Bob ? ” 

“ Sixteen my last birthday.” 

“ You should be getting the education preparatory 
to college. It is a bad thing to miss, education. I 
never had a chance for more than the rudiments, and 
it has always handicapped me.” 

190 


My Heel Finds an Oyster 

“ Not if we spend the rest of our lives here.” 

The captain laughed. “ More here than in the 
biggest city in the world, Bob. Right here on this 
island, possibly, are all the necessities and luxuries of 
life, and we without education enough to make use of 
them or even know them when we see them. Suppose 
I had a working knowledge of botany instead of a 
casual acquaintance with plant life, picked up here 
and there. I could classify a hundred plants and herbs 
that we are passing over unnoticed, finding some more 
valuable than any we know. Suppose I had a scientific 
knowledge of chemistry, would I be worrying about 
the powder getting low ? I’d be making gunpowder 
and hunting minerals in those mountains to mould 
into bullets and shot.” 

“ I was thinking more of a classical education,” I 
admitted. 

“ Even that may be sadly missed in the wild places. 
If I had been grounded in the Latin tongue, how much 
more easily I might have acquired my Spanish and 
French and I would speak them as the educated talk, 
not the language of the soldier and peon. It all has 
its value, Bob, in every place in the world and in every 
walk of life, and I hate to see you miss your chance by 
this adventure.” 

“ But I am learning more from you, here in the 
wilderness, than I should at school, Captain,” I insisted. 

“ You soon will know my all,” he said, and there 
was the note of sadness in his voice. 

191 


Castaway Island 

“ Captain, I am contented and happy here. If there 
was a ship putting in ready to drop anchor out there 
right now ” 

“ The light ! Bob, the light ! ” shouted Stimson, 
jumping to his feet. My eyes found it as had his, at 
its coming. There on the sky-line, between the head- 
lands of the bay, where the deep blue of the sky 
lightened imperceptibly to meet the blue of the sea, it 
sprang instantaneously into being, a second full moon 
rising in the west. It was unmistakably our light of 
the open sea, of the night I walked in my sleep, clear 
white with a tinge of blue, without flicker or variation. 
Where there had been nothing but blackness a moment 
before, now was a great blue-white light, a ball of in- 
candescence at the edge of the sea. 

With it came awe. I felt the same dread and terror 
of the unknown that crept over me at that first sight 
of its mystery and I moved close to the erect form of 
Stimson, leaning forward toward it, striving to focus 
the glass upon it. It was weird, impossible ! It was a 
spectral thing that seemed of another world. Silently 
Stimson handed me the binoculars and I found the 
light on its field. 

There was nothing but the light, only a trifle inten- 
sified by the lenses. There was no explanation in 
the glasses. “ Captain/’ I said, passing them back to 
him, “ what do you think ? ” 

He laughed jerkily. “ As before, I cannot guess,” 
he said. “ Certainly not a ship’s search-light all this 
192 


My Heel Finds an Oyster 

time in that one place. That is absurd ! It is more 
than three months since we first saw it.” 

“ Yes ; more than three months.” 

“ If there was any island off there with this light 
upon it we could see the land with the glasses at day- 
time.” 

“ There is no island there,” I declared. 

“ If it was a submarine volcano in action there would 
be commotion of the sea. Then, too, we should see 
smoke by day as well as fire at night. Is it where it 
was before, Bob ? ” 

I thought so, but it was difficult to judge with any 
certainty, for we had never looked at it twice from the 
same place. In the same general direction, certainly. 

“ I hate this inability to solve a mystery,” Stimson 
declared with an energy that surprised me and showed 
me how much he, too, was affected by the weirdness 
of the light. “ Yet I dare not sail for it. I can 
do nothing — nothing but make futile guesses. Bob, 
would you like now the education that would dissolve 
that light into its components and tell you whether it 
was electric arc or star or planet? ” 

“ That could be done ? ” I asked. 

“ Any physicist could solve the point in short order.” 

“ You say you dare not sail for it. Why not?” 

“ It is beyond view of this island, probably. We 
might not be able to return here ; might pass this by, 
for big as the island seems it is but a tiny spot on the 
broad ocean. Then how to find the light which is 
i93 


Castaway Island 

much smaller and, unfortunately, does not shine every 
night.” 

I had built up the fire for the comfort of its blaze 
and we now lay down beside it and watched the distant 
flame until the moon crossed into the west to vie with 
it. Then my eyes grew tired and I dozed off to awaken 
only at the captain’s call in the morning sunlight. 

“ Nothing there, Bob,” he said, as my eyes turned 
toward the horizon. The light went out about two 
— disappeared just as suddenly as it came. Now let’s 
forget it, and become pearl fishers.” 

We brought the raft closer in and at Stimson’s di- 
rection carried a dozen or more large rocks aboard, 
sculling the craft back over the oyster beds. He went 
out much farther than he had been the previous even- 
ing, into water about fifteen feet deep. A square of 
canvas was attached by its corners to a line and placing 
a stone in its center, Stimson sunk it to the bottom, 
the end of the line tied to the mast. It was to be the 
receptacle to hold the catch. His knife was thrown by 
a line over his shoulder and was the only piece of 
clothing he wore. Then, with a stone in either hand 
to carry him down, he jumped over the side. 

It was my duty to watch for sharks, and I had the 
rifle ready and studied the water to seaward for the 
first sight of a fin breaking the surface. In less than 
a minute Stimson’s wet head poked up near the raft, 
gasping for breath. “ Hand me another rock,” he 
said. “ Business is good,” and down he went again. 

194 


My Heel Finds an Oyster 

I watched him squirming about on the bottom, 
working with toes and hands, then gave my mind to 
my duty. There was not a ripple to indicate sharks. 
Stimson came up again and again, going back each 
time after a minute or two above. Finally he climbed 
aboard. “ Haul away, Bob,” he commanded. “ Full 
up below.” 

The canvas came over the side heavy laden and we 
emptied its contents on deck, a wet mass of jagged 
shells that must have weighed fifty pounds. Putting 
aside the rifle, I helped Stimson open shells, for neither 
of us could wait, but must find out at once what we 
had captured in the way of fortune. The first oysters 
opened showed mother of pearl, the indication that our 
bivalves were not the ordinary, culinary kind. 

Stimson made the first find, a pearl blister. It was 
a raising of the interior lining of the shell and looked, 
as its name indicated, an opalescent blister of mother 
of pearl ; but it would have to be cut from the shell 
before it could be mounted. “ It has a value, but 
nothing like what a detached pearl would bring,” the 
captain explained. “ In fact, all these shells have 
value. Pearl handles for knives, buttons and other 
things are manufactured from mother of pearl. We’ll 
keep our shell, but we’ll hunt for pearls.” 

I found one, bigger than the seed pearl of last night, 
but not large enough to arouse us to wild enthusiasm. 
“ About ten dollars’ worth,” was Stimson’s valuation. 
“ Find them bigger and we get rich faster.” But that 
i95 


Castaway Island 

was all the riches we gathered from the catch, and I 
had a blister on my hand larger than the pearl blister 
before the last shell was opened. 

* Stimson was not at all discouraged. “ One pearl in 
a thousand shell is the average, I’ve heard,” he said. 
“ I’ll go back after more,” and he resumed diving 
operations. 

All day long we gathered oysters and opened oysters, 
the net result at the close of the afternoon being three 
small pearls and a pile of unopened oysters that half 
filled the raft. Stimson said we could work on them 
while we sailed southward down the coast. The idea 
of leaving them to open by themselves after rotting 
was too slow and unexciting. We wanted to know 
what was inside. 

Stimson would not let me dive, although I begged for 
the chance of gathering shell fifteen feet below the 
surface. It was not sharks that he feared, for we saw 
none all day, but the pressure of water on my ear- 
drums. He was used to diving, yet he was almost 
deaf that evening from the strain of the water in his 
ears. 

We rowed out through the heads next morning, 
picking up a wind from the northeast, and resumed 
our journey. Gradually the high bluffs drew away to 
the north and we could look across plains that ran 
back to the foot-hills of the mountains, plains barren 
of trees and green with tall grass of the rainy season. 


196 



CHAPTER XVI 
MY FIRE GOES OUT 

“ \ TS TE might just as well use these for bait as be 
VV dumping them over the side,” said Stimson, 
referring to oysters. “ There are usually fish in the 
sea.” 

11 We haven’t hooks for sea fish,” I stated. “ Our 
small ones wouldn’t hold anything bigger than a 
perch.” 

“ That’s easy.” Stimson picked up one of the oyster 
shells. With the handle of his heavy knife he broke 
it, then threw it away. A second one he cracked more 
carefully, handing me a curving rim of shell that 
formed the crude shape of a hook. “ Polish that 
down, sharpen the point and barb it and you’ll have a 
South Sea fish-hook,” he said. “ There are always < 
fish-hooks everywhere,” he added. “ Somehow they 
are provided so that no man need want for food where 
197 


Castaway Island 

there are fish. I believe it is a providence for cast- 
away sailor men." 

He went back to the task of opening shells for pearls 
while I rigged a line to troll behind the raft. We 
were bowling along at a great rate with a fresh breeze 
behind us and a strong current setting in along the 
coast, now free of dangerous rocks. The “ Cozy Cask ” 
was rapidly nearing the southern end of the island, 
marked by a single, tall mountain peak. 

I had my foot done up in a bandage because of the 
cut, and one hand in a rag from blisters and I had 
tired of opening oysters for pearls that did not develop. 
Sitting at the stern of the raft with a line in my hand 
waiting for a bite was better sport and I lolled lazily 
there, watching the sea and sky and the hills which 
ran back from the sea to meet the mountains. 

“ Jiminetty ! ” I heard Stimson mutter; then, 
“ Look here, Bob ! ” and I jumped to his side. 

“ What is it? A pearl? ” I asked eagerly. 

“ Look ! ” He placed a small object on the palm of 
my hand. It was a pearl by its color and luster, but 
the oddest shaped pearl I had ever seen. It was like a 
little, squatting man. 

“ Why, it’s a pearl image ! ” I gasped, studying it. 

“ It's Buddha, god of the Buddhists,” he said. 

“But it's pearl? You found it in an oyster?” I 
asked, not able to understand. 

Stimson nodded. “ It is real pearl, found in this 
shell,” and he held it for me to see. 

198 


My Fire Goes Out 

“It just happened to look like this — so human ?” 
I asked. 

“ So unhuman you mean/’ laughed Stimson. “That 
isn’t the astonishing part of this, Bob. I can tell you 
how it came to be that shape, but I can’t tell you how 
it came in this oyster, for that means a Chinese fisher- 
man has been in Ostrich Bay within five years.” 

“ How do you mean ? ” 

“ The nucleus of this pearl was placed in the shell 
by a Chinaman. As oysters are not supposed to make 
extended journeys, and as they haven’t more than six 
or seven years of life, the inference is that this oyster 
was inoculated here and within that limit of time. 
And, Bob, it means that the man who did it intends to 
come back.” 

“ Tell me how it was done,” I said eagerly. “ How 
are pearls made? I always thought they just hap- 
pened.” 

“Usually they do just happen; that is, some parasite 
gets into the oyster’s interior, and to protect itself 
against the parasite, the oyster deposits around it a 
juice which hardens. Successive deposits build up the 
pearl, the nucleus of which is this tiny worm or mi- 
crobe. That is the natural pearl, usually round, some- 
times oval. The pearl blister is where the parasite has 
bored into the shell and the oyster has healed it by 
depositing pearl matter over the entrance.” 

“ This Buddha image couldn’t have bored in.” 

“ Of course not. A Chinaman took a live oyster, 
199 


Castaway Island 

carefully pried open the shells and with a split piece 
of bamboo inserted a tiny bit of carved ivory or a clay 
image ; then he replaced the oyster in its bed to wait 
three or four years while the oyster built it into pearl. 
Probably hundreds of oysters in Ostrich Bay are 
making pearl images of Buddha.” 

“ Are they very valuable ? ” 

“ Not so valuable as a round pearl of the same 
weight, no, but if we had this in San Francisco’s Chi- 
natown we’d be able to sell it for enough so we’d not 
starve for a time. We will go back to Oyster Bay 
when we’ve circled the island, Bob.” 

“ Looking for Buddhas ? ” 

“ To place a signal for the Chinese pearl fisher when 
he comes back, so he may know we are waiting here 
for him to take us off.” 

“ You are certain he was Chinese?” Stimson 
nodded. “ I thought their god was Confucius.” 

“ No. Confucius was a man, a philosopher and 
teacher, not a god. He gave the Chinese rules of liv- 
ing, not religion. The most of China as well as India 
is Buddhist.” 

Stimson continued his work of opening shells and I 
returned to fishing, but neither of us was rewarded by 
the luck which is supposed to guard fishermen. Oys- 
ters and sea fish refused to give us food or fortune ; so 
we made camp early in the afternoon, selecting a place 
on the beach where a little cove gave the “ Cozy Cask ” 
a sheltered anchorage. We had brought two casks of 
200 


My Fire Goes Out 

water with us, but it was warm, flat and unpleasant to 
the taste, and Stimson suggested that we make a search 
for fresh water in the hills behind us. I forgot all 
about my cut heel in the excitement of a shore excur- 
sion and we started off together, Stimson with the 
rifle and I with the spatter gun. 

“ There is some sort of stream in the southern half 
of the island,” Stimson declared, “ or we'd find more 
sign of horses along Roaring River. I have an idea it 
takes its rise up there on the divide and flows south- 
ward. If I'm right, we should break into it in a few 
hours' hike.” 

I limped a little, although I concealed the fact from 
Stimson as much as possible as we climbed up the 
grass-grown plain, deep in green tangle of vines and 
low brush. There was no shade, nothing higher than 
the sage or an occasional cactus, rearing bare with 
spiny arms. It was an extremely hot afternoon and 
before we had gone an hour I was suffering from thirst 
and the pain in my foot, but made no complaint for 
fear the captain would turn back. 

Only once did we see game. A pair of pheasants 
got up from the scrub and I hit one of them, dropping 
it, wounded, in the grass, then could not find it. We 
wasted half an hour looking for the bird. A little 
later we saw a dust cloud far ahead which must have 
been made by a band of horses or cattle, but even the 
glasses failed to distinguish which. 

The mountains with the afternoon sun upon them 
201 


Castaway Island 

seemed no nearer than at the beach, and we had come 
a long way over the moor. Neither was there any 
sign of a watercourse in the distance before us. 
Stimson suggested that we give over the search and 
return to the raft, but I had to confess I was too lame 
for it. I could never make the distance back on my 
wounded foot. We could go on and I would keep up 
as long as I was able, trying to find water, but to return 
over those sun-blistered plains was impossible for me. 

Finally Stimson came to a halt at the top of a rise. 
“ We’ll camp here,” he said, “ and I’ll go ahead for 
food and water. No use your wearing yourself out 
with that game foot.” 

He left me the rifle, for there was better chance at 
game with the shotgun, and he took the empty water 
bag. “ I’ll be back when I find water,” he promised. 
“ Take it easy and don’t worry,” and he went on to 
the east. 

I took the bandages from my cut, finding that it 
had opened and was bleeding. It was swelling, too, 
and had an ugly look about it that made me rebandage 
it quickly. Then I lay down in the grass and waited 
for Stimson to return. 

Below me to the west lay the sea, stretching out to 
the horizon’s rim and the sun made a path of gold 
across it to its edge, tinged the plains with an orange 
hue, and made the mountains behind me pink and 
lavender with deep blue in the shadows. From the 
edge of the sea in the west to the mountain tops in the 
202 


My Fire Goes Out 

east there was nothing to indicate life, no motion of 
land, of sea or sky. 

I grew more lonesome as the sun went down. I had 
not expected the captain before dark, had anticipated 
a wait perhaps well into the night, but the approach- 
ing twilight, creeping slowly to wipe out sea and hills, 
gave me nervous chills. Limping painfully about, I 
gathered dry sage-brush and built a fire, hoping it 
would dispel my weakness of fear. 

The fire ate up the lightwood as rapidly as I could 
gather it, and finally it was too dark to find fuel that 
would keep up a blaze for more than a minute or two. 
Dried grass and dead sage made a flare that was gone 
almost in its making, and had it not been that I feared 
Stimson would pass me by in the night, I should have 
given over my attempt. 

I kept matches in a cartridge shell, corked, that 
they might be free from damp. This building and re- 
building of fires had used them until but two re- 
mained. I must not run out of matches until Stimson 
came, for a flare at the right moment would prevent 
his going by me. 

The moon would be up later, about ten, then I 
should be able to see him at a distance, and he would 
be able to recognize the landmarks of this place where 
he had left me. I must keep my signals going at 
intervals until then. Two matches were entirely in- 
adequate unless I could find some fuel more slow in 
combustion than weeds. 


203 


Castaway Island 

Hobbling painfully, I groped in widening circles 
about my camp, feeling with outstretched hands in 
the grass for stick or stalk, brush or root. A sudden 
rustling almost beneath my feet gave me a start that 
sent me hurrying back to the dying fire. Something 
alive was in the deep grass, and my imagination built 
the noise into snakes without effort on my part. I 
was frightened. I tried to blow the embers into flame, 
but they were too nearly ash. The fire went out. 

I sat there in the darkness quivering with fear, my 
ears catching and magnifying each sound of the night, 
each breath of wind in the grass, and my excited fancy 
painting nightmare horrors. There was, perhaps, fever 
from the c for my brow burned and my eyes ached. 

I used u.e next to the last match to raise a mo- 
mentary flame to mitigate my fears, and I tried fever- 
ishly to nurse it along with grass and tiny twigs, but 
the grass was green and the fire went out. Almost 
with its last spark came that blue-white flame across 
the sea, the mysterious night light, and, strangely 
enough, it came to comfort me. It was an acquaint- 
ance, something I had known before, and it soothed my 
fears. I sat watching its steady gleam, and my fever 
quieted. The rustlings in the grass, the visions of 
serpents, even the pain of my wound dissipated in the 
friendliness of this glowing ball of fire. 

The sound of a shot came to me through the air. 
It seemed to come from below me, from seaward, but I 
knew that must be a fallacy of the echoing hills. 

204 


My Fire Goes Out 

Stimson, had he passed me, could not have been so far 
away as the sound of that shot. It was so indistinct, 
so distant that it was barely audible. If it had come 
from the west, it must have been out on the sea and 
that was impossible. No, the shot was behind me, to 
the eastward ; Stimson was signaling me. I raised the 
rifle and fired twice into the air. 

Forgetting my fear of snakes and noises, I gathered 
brush and built a fire with the last of my matches, and 
I hobbled farther away to bring fuel to keep it ablaze. 
Then I heard Stimson’s call, “ Ahoy, Bob I I'm com- 
ing I ” and I ran to meet him. 

I was in Stimson’s arms and I was crying for the 
joy of it. “ Why, Bobbin ! ” he said cheerily, sooth- 
ingly. “ Don’t, lad ! There’s nothing to fear. I'm 
back and here’s water.” He held the bag to my lips. 
I had not realized before how parched and fevered for 
water I was. I drank and drank until he took it from 
me, placing his hand to my forehead. “ What’s the 
matter, Bob ? ” he asked. “ You are sick ? ” 

“ I don’t know — sick or frightened. Both, I guess,” 
I answered, laughing. “ But I’m all right now, 
Captain.” 

He supported me with an arm about me to the fire, 
burned again to a few coals that glowed amid the ash. 
“ You are all worn out, Bob,” he said. “ What is it ? 
Has the cut been aching ? ” 

“ It is worse, I think, but it isn’t that. Captain, I 
was lonely and scared. I heard snakes and things in 
205 


Castaway Island 

the brush. I am just an ordinary coward with you 
gone.” 

“ Not that, ever, Bob. No, you’re far from being a 
coward, as this fire and your signal shots prove. You 
did just the right thing, Bob, for I could never have' 
found you if it had not been for your signals.” 

“ I only answered yours.” 

“ Mine ? ” Stimson stared at me in amazement. 

“ Your shot,” I explained. 

“ I did not shoot. Tell me what you mean,” cried 
Stimson, and he turned to look at the light at the 
water’s brim. My legs crumpled under me, and I fell 
to the ground beside him. 

“You — did — not — shoot?” I gasped, touching him 
with my hand in the fear he might vanish. “ You did 
shoot, Captain. I heard you shoot. Just before I 
fired, you shot.” 

Stimson sat down beside me and his arm went around 
me. “ Don’t bother so, Bob. You are sick, feverish 
from your wound. You thought you heard me, but 
it was a sound of the night, intensified by your fever.” 

I could hardly believe my ears now. Stimson’s 
denial of the shot seemed more a delirium, less reality 
than had the shot. That was in my ears yet, the 
reverberating boom of gunpowder, and it was un- 
mistakable. 

“Stimson,” I said, quieting my voice to make it con-, 
vincing, “ there was a gunshot a minute before I fired 
the rifle. You heard the rifle ? ” 

206 


My Fire Goes Out 

“ Yes — twice. You fired twice ? ” 

“ I fired twice, following a gunshot. Did vou not 
hear that ? ” 

“ No, only the rifle. I was not a half mile up the 
hill, and was afraid I had passed you. Then came the 
signal shots and the flame of your fire.” 

“ The shot I heard and answered seemed to come 
from the sea, but I thought that was delusion for it 
must be you. It was a gunshot, Captain ; there can be 
no mistake about that.” 

Stimson sat silent looking seaward at the flame. “ I 
wish I knew what that was,” he said finally, pointing 
at it. “ But come, Bob, we’ll have food. I killed a 
chicken in the wood beside the river. We will broil 
it.” 

“ You believe I heard a gun ? ” I asked. 

“ I do. Give me a match to start a fire.” Stimson 
evidently wished to change the subject. 

“ Mine are gone, Captain,” I replied. “ I used them 
all keeping up the signal.” 

“ Then we don’t eat to-night,” laughed Stimson. “ I 
haven’t one, and I am almost hungry enough to eat 
this chicken raw. Well, we must wait till we get back 
to the raft in the morning.” 

After redressing my wound, which he bathed care- 
fully in the remainder of the water, we lay down for 
sleep and the captain told me of his search for the 
river. He had discovered it not five miles from where 
he left me, but the water was brackish with salt from 
207 


Castaway Island 

the sea and he was convinced that there was tide-water 
backed up in it, so had sought higher up toward its 
source. For mile after mile he had walked along its 
marshy bank, testing it by taste, and it still remained 
undrinkable. 

It was sunset before he found the river flowing with 
a current that gave the water freshness and after drink- 
ing his fill he started back with a full water bag. He 
killed the chicken beside the stream, and he found a 
trail of wild horses leading to it, as he felt certain he 
would ; but he spent no time in hunting. He was 
anxious to get back to me, so took his course by the 
sun and made straight over the hills. 

I told him of the rustling in the grass that had 
frightened me and he placed the blame on hares. “ I 
saw sign of rabbits/' he explained, “ and I have no 
doubt there are many of them on the moor. It isn’t a 
likely place for snakes.” So he reassured me, and I 
slept. 


208 



CHAPTER XVII 
THE LOXG SHOT 

" T T USH ! ” warned Stimson, hunching me with his 
A JL elbow into wakefulness. “ Be quiet as a mouse, 
but look ! ” 

The early sun was making long shadows of the 
mountains across the plains as I cautiously lifted my 
head to peer above the grass. Between us and the 
mountains, not a half mile away, six horses came 
trotting quietly along, approaching us. At their head 
was the same black stallion we had seen before. Sleep 
left my eyes at the sight of their tossing manes and 
209 


Castaway Island 

waving tails, and I could hardly repress a cry of ad- 
miration. 

The herd were coming from their morning drink, 
and their course would bring them within a hundred 
feet of where we were concealed. I reached for the 
rifle, but Stimson smilingly shook his head. I re- 
membered then that horses were not game. 

We both studied the black leader as they approached. 
He was much larger than his mates, a magnificent 
animal, and he pranced along with arched neck as 
though to display to the others his agility and morning 
gaiety. 

Suddenly we saw him pause, fore legs stiffening to 
stay his motion, haunches bending to hold him back, 
and there came a frightened neigh from his high 
thrown head. The herd turned and raced away at a 
gallop, but the stallion stood his ground, pawing the 
turf and breathing in loud snorts. 

“ What ails them ? " the captain whispered. “ They 
couldn't have seen us." 

“ Must have scented us," I answered as cautiously. 

“ Wind's still in the northeast. No — look, Bob ! " 

From a little bunch of sage-brush came two dogs, 
and in their tigerish motions was the evident intention 
of an attack upon the black stallion, and he seemed to 
relish the prospect. He watched them circle in ap- 
proach, keeping his head toward them, stamping the 
ground with neighs of defiance. 

“ No, no, I'll not stand for this," said Stimson, seiz- 
210 


The Long Shot 

ing the rifle I still held. “ I don't want my horse all 
ripped to pieces by these pesky dogs ! I'll stop this ! " 

I had to laugh at Stimson's claim to ownership in 
the black horse he had failed as yet to trap. “ He 
doesn't need his master’s help," I whispered. “ He 
can take care of himself." 

One of the dogs sprang at his throat, but the black, 
with bared teeth, lurched forward and we heard the 
canine yelp of pain as the beast was thrown aside. 
The second dog, taking advantage of that moment of 
time, gained a position in rear of the horse and would 
have ham-strung him had not Stimson's rifle spoke. 
It was a long shot, nearly five hundred yards, but the 
dog leaped high in air, dropping dead on the ground. 

The captain dared not fire at the other dog, for it 
was between us and the stallion, and there were too 
many chances of wounding the horse. He threw an- 
other cartridge into the chamber and waited his oppor- 
tunity. Cautiously the dog circled, but the horse was 
facing it, watching its every movement. Then the 
horse charged, lowering his head and plunging with 
bared teeth at his assailant, and the dog fled in fright. 
It was a chase now, the dog with tail between its legs 
running for safety with the triumphant stallion behind, 
and so they disappeared from our view. 

“ Whew ! " breathed Stimson. “ I wouldn't have 
that black hurt for all the pearls in Ostrich Bay ! I'm* 
going to ride him yet." 

“ You'll have to catch him first, Captain," I laughed, 
21 1 


Castaway Island 

“ and he does not act as though that were easy. What 
is your scheme ? ” 

Stimson did not reply. Instead he asked me how 
my foot was feeling and insisted on looking at it. He 
scowled as he saw how badly it was swollen. “ Can 
you walk on it ? ” he asked. 

I made a fairly successful attempt. “ We’ll make 
for the raft,” he said, “ taking it easy, and I’ll help you 
when it gets too painful. Let’s make a start.” 

We did start, but we made hardly any distance. I 
was right where I had heard the rustling in the brush 
the night before when I heard it again. Also I heard 
a whining that I had not heard the previous time. 

“ Captain ! ” I called ; he was behind me. “ There 
is something here in the brush.” 

He came running up, cocking the rifle. I had 
stopped dead in my tracks and was peering into the 
mass of sage and weeds ; then I dropped to my knees 
with a joyous cry. “ Puppies I Why, it’s puppies ! ” 
I shouted. 

“ Careful, there I Careful, Bob,” warned Stimson, 
but I had already grasped one of the little, soft fluffs 
of fur in my arms and was hobbling after another. 
They were too small to be fearful of, three wee puppies 
barely old enough to be taken from their mother. 
Stimson helped me capture them, and I was in great 
glee at my find. 

“ Going to foster-mother them ? ” asked the captain, 
as I cuddled the three in my arms. 

212 


The Long Shot 

“ May I ? ” I asked eagerly. “ May I bring them up 
and tame them ? ” 

“ There is a mother dog somewhere out there on the 
plain. Going to leave her without any family ? ” 

I thought for a minute. I wanted them very much, - 
but Stimson had given me another aspect of the mat- 
ter to consider. Was it fair to rob the mother of her 
puppies? 

“ I’ll take them,” I said finally, for the anticipated 
pleasure of their education and the fun of having 
three dogs to follow me offset the sorrow of the mother 
dog ; and I added, “ That is, if you don’t say no, 
Captain.” 

“ The matter is up to you, Bob,” he replied and 
made no farther comment, while I snuggled them into 
the breast of my shirt and started on the way to the 
beach. 

We had gone about half the distance when Stimson 
came to a stop. “ Where’s the raft, Bob ? ” he asked, 
and I took my eyes from my new family to look over 
the cove where we had left the “ Cozy Cask.” No- 
where was it visible. 

“ Could it have drifted away?” I asked anxiously, 
while Stimson adjusted the binoculars to focus. 

He studied the shore line without replying, then 
moved over to where he had more extended view. 

“ Not in sight,” he said, at last. 

“ It may be close in on the beach behind some of 
the bluffs,” I suggested. 


213 


Castaway Island 

“ I hope so, though the bluffs are barely high enough 
to conceal it, unless it has wrecked and broken up. 
She couldn’t drift very close to the beach, Bob.” 

I knew that she needed fully two feet of water to 
ride in safety and that the shingle ran gradually slop- 
ing into the sea, so if she was afloat as a whole she 
would be in sight, not behind the bluffs ; and the 
knowledge came to me that the “ Cozy Cask ” was 
gone. Stimson had realized the fact almost at once, 
that she was either a wreck on the beach or had gone 
out to sea, and with it all our water and provisions. 

I started at a limping run for the sea, but Stimson 
halted me with a cry. “ No hurry now, Bob,” he 
called. “ Come back,” and I rejoined him. 

“ What shall we do?” I asked, my anxiety height- 
ened by immediate hunger and thirst. 

“ Will that foot of yours stand up for a ten-mile 
hike? ” questioned Stimson in reply. I nodded doubt- 
fully. “ Then start back over the hills for the river,” 
he commanded. “ I am going to the beach to make 
certain the raft was stolen ” 

“ Stolen ? ” I gasped. 

“ Stolen by the man who fired the shot last night. 
I will catch up with you before you have made many 
miles. If you hear me fire two shots in quick succes- 
sion, turn back; I’ll have found the raft. Otherwise 
make as many miles eastward as your wound will let 
you. We must have water and food.” 

“ We have no matches.” 

214 


The Long Shot 

“ I know. There are ways to make fire. Water is 
the main thing, so start for it, Bob.” 

He left me the shotgun, and I began the painful 
journey back over the hills which I had already trav- 
eled twice, while he hurried for the beach. I was 
thirsty, my throat dry and my tongue swollen, but it 
was no time to be thinking of that. I still carried the 
three puppies and I was glad Stimson had not remem- 
bered them in his anxiety about the raft. I was sure 
he would have made me abandon them, but they were 
snugly asleep in my blouse, and I was willing to as- 
sume the extra burden. 

I kept looking back as I walked, for Stimson was 
running toward the shore and I hoped each minute to 
see him wave his hand to indicate that he had found 
the raft ; but he disappeared behind the hills and I 
saw him no more. Then as I limped on my way I 
hoped for the recall of the rifle shots, but they did not 
come. I came to the camp of the previous night and 
passed it, taking the direction Stimson had returned 
from the river. The sun rose higher and burned more 
fiercely ; the cut in my heel ached and throbbed and 
each step was agony ; my dry tongue felt like sand- 
paper in my mouth. 

Hunger takes a quick second place for thirst. I had 
eaten nothing since noon the previous da’y and never 
in my life, even during the days of shipwreck and 
raft, had I been twenty-four hours without food, but I 
forgot hunger completely in my craving for water. I 
215 


Castaway Island 

believed myself thirsty the night before, but it was 
nothing to this thirstiness. Every nerve in me cried 
for water. It was my only thought. 

I plodded heavily on, giving no attention to what 
was about me, seeing only the heat waves of the sun. 
The puppies awoke and whined, but I heard them 
vaguely as in a dream. I knew I was to keep going 
toward the east where there was water ; that was all. 

The remainder of that trip is a vague, fevered dream 
in my memory. Stimson told me how he caught up 
with me, I staggering on and on ; and how I did not 
know him at all, or that he was with me. I had 
dropped the gun ; fortunately, he found it ; but I was 
holding to the crying puppies as though they were to 
save me. He helped me over the last half of the way, 
carrying me at times, supporting me always, and we 
made the river by two of the afternoon. 

I do remember that drink, lying flat on my stomach 
in the wet mud of the bank, stopped from the bliss of 
absorbing all I wanted by Stimson's hand over my 
mouth. I remember his “ Steady, Bob ; take it easy. 
A little at a time does it,” as he doled it out to me. I 
remember the puppies lapping drink at my side. I 
seemed to awake then to the pain of my wound and a 
desperate hunger. 

“ You'll be all right soon,” said Stimson as I began 
to question how I came there. “ You made it, Bob, and 
with some food in your stomach you'll be lively as a 
parrot.” 


216 


The Long Shot 

“ Did you find the raft? 77 I asked weakly, and Stim- 
son shook his head. He was unbinding the rag from 
the cut and I saw his face draw into a scowl as he 
looked at it. My glance followed his to see a swollen 
and purplish foot that was ugly in line and coloring. 

“ Infected / 7 said Stimson, then bit his lip to keep 
back other words. 

“ Don't be afraid to tell me / 7 I said. “ What is it ? 77 

“ Poisoned by the shell. I should have given it 
attention at the time. Now you’re in for a sore 
foot . 77 

“ I have that / 7 I said. 

“ You’ll have worse. We’re going to cure it, but it 
will take time. I should have done what I am going 
to do now at once and I’d have saved you some pain. 
No cut is safe in this climate. I should have known 
that, too, better than most men . 77 

“ It looked trifling enough / 7 I said, for I did not 
want Stimson to blame himself. “ I’ll take any pain 
it costs without a howl, Captain . 77 

He smiled. “ Good boy ! ” he said. “ First food, 
then I’ll doctor you. I still have the chicken, Bob.” 

“ Raw ? 77 I asked, and even raw it sounded pleasantly 
to my ears. 

“ No ; cooked. Broiled. Salted, too. Just as fine a 
chicken as you ever ate.” 

“ Matches ? 77 I queried. 

“ Plenty of ways to make fire. I might rub a stick 
into a bit of rotted log as they do all over the South 
217 


Castaway Island 

Sea islands, but that would raise blisters on my palms 
and take too long. I might use my watch crystal, fill- 
ing its cavity with water to give me a convex lens, but 
why waste time with crudities when we have a perfect 
sun glass, readily unscrewed, thus ” — he illustrated 
words with action — " in these binoculars.” 

He held the objective glass from one barrel of the 
binoculars so that a sunbeam focused on my hand 
and I drew it quickly away. It burned in the moment. 
“ Give me a pinch of powder from the horn,” he said, 
and placing it in a spot of sunshine, gathered dry grass, 
twigs and larger wood and built up material for a fire. 
Then, with a “ Watch it, Bob ! ” he brought the glass 
to catch the sun, brought the bright spot down to pin- 
head size. The loose powder caught with a sizzle, 
setting the grass ablaze and, as quickly as a match 
could have done it, a fire was burning. 

“ Why, Captain,” I said, “ it is as simple as rolling 
off a log ! ” 

“ Simpler — when you have the glass.” He spitted 
the fowl on a green wand, raked coals from the fire, 
and left me to turn it over the embers while he went 
down the stream for salt. That, too, was simple for 
the captain, knowing where to look on the rocks beside 
the river where the high tide would leave sea water to 
evaporate. He brought back salt and also a bundle of 
dry seaweed so big that he could barely carry it all. 

“ Why the kelp ? ” I asked him. 

“ You'll find out after dinner. Is it ready ? ” 

218 


The Long Shot 

“ It has been smelling so delicious that I barely held 
myself away from it,” I answered. 

“ Then to it,” he commanded and we tore it apart 
with our fingers and ate as the cave men did and with 
all their voracity. It filled the vacancy of a full day’s 
hunger quite acceptably, although I might have eaten 
more. 

Stimson dug a shallow hole in the ground, piled the 
kelp above it and set it afire with some blazing brush 
to assist combustion. When it burned down to a fused 
mass of ash, he threw water upon it, breaking it up 
and forming it into a thick, sticky mud, which he 
allowed to cool. “ Put your hoof into that, Bob,” he 
said. “ There’s your medicine.” 

I pulled off the bandage and plunged my foot into 
the mess, then yanked it out with a yell. “ Ouch ! ” 
I shouted. “ It burns ! ” 

“ Not too hot?” asked Stimson, sticking his hand 
into the mud. “ No. Back you go, Bob, with the 
foot. I said it would pain, but we’re going to save 
that foot from coming off, and it will require heroic 
methods. Be a man ! ” 

I tried to grin. “ I agreed not to howl, Captain, and 
I won’t again. Here goes,” and I gritted my teeth as 
the sting went up the nerves of my leg. “ What do 
you call this medicine?” I asked, when I could speak 
for the pain. 

“ It’s an antiseptic, crude enough, but it will, I hope, 
kill the bacteria that have infected your cut. There’s 
219 


Castaway Island 

iodine in that mess, Bob, quite a bit of it, and iodine 
is a germ destroyer. How does it feel now ? ” 

“ That iodine is working, Captain/' I groaned. “ If 
it doesn’t kill me it ought to get the germs.” 

He kept my foot, buried well above the ankle, in 
that mud all the afternoon. After the first hour or so, 
it lost sensation and I was not uncomfortable. In the 
evening, after giving me a supper of broiled pheasant, 
he washed my foot, inspected it carefully, voiced ap- 
proval of the treatment and gave me the cheerful in- 
formation that I must keep it in the mess all night 
long. Again it hurt for a time upon immersion, but 
for a shorter period, and Stimson rigged up a sloping 
back of boughs for me to lean against, built a large 
camp-fire beside me, and made us both as comfortable 
as possible for the night. 

I could not sleep a minute. The puppies, — I had 
already named them Rags, Tags and Jags — filled to 
the brim with chicken meat and pheasant broth, curled 
up beside me and snoozed happily. Even Stimson 
dozed off after a time. I was like one chained to a 
post, forced to retain a single position that cramped me 
and gave me aches in every muscle, that sent pains 
through my nerves and nightmares to my brain. 

Our camp beside the river was in a bordering thicket 
of small trees and brush. Across the stream, some 
twenty yards wide, was a larger and thicker jungle 
which ran back through marsh-land to the high ground 
where began the mountains. Through the tops of 
220 


The Long Shot 

these trees I watched the moon rise, a great disc with 
one edge slightly nibbled, for it was in its last quarter, 
and from these trees I heard a long, lugubrious howl. 
It was a wailing cry, like nothing I could remember 
ever hearing on the island or elsewhere. 

I did not like to awaken Stimson, for he was tired 
out and needed sleep. The rifle was within my reach, 
so I quietly threw the lever which pumped a cartridge 
into the chamber and held it across my knees, strain- 
ing my eyes to pierce the black shadows of the wood 
across the river. 


221 



CHAPTER XVIII 

I SEE A STRANGE SMOKE 

T HE wail came again, louder, closer, and I heard a 
splashing in the water beneath the tangle of trees. 
Stimson, awakening with all his faculties alert, whis- 
pered, “ What’s wrong, Bob ? ” 

“ A howl from across the river, very close,” I 
answered. “ Listen ! ” 

It came again, sad and dismal, deep fraught with 
melancholy, and with it the sound of some animal 
taking to the water. I handed Stimson the rifle and 
he moved to the edge of the stream. The moon behind 
the foliage of the trees threw deep shadows on the river 
and we could see no more than a line of ripples, the 
wake of the swimmer, as it passed our camp. 

Stimson threw new fuel on the fire, causing it to 
blaze up brightly. “ Do you see anything out there? ” 
he asked, returning to my side. 

222 


I See a Strange Smoke 

“ No. It is too dark to see anything more than the 
line of the shore.” 

“ It turned below there. I caught a flash of the 
water as it headed up-stream. Hush ! ” 

We both listened tensely. I almost stopped breath- 
ing. Then came the sound of swimming, the splash 
of a large animal not accustomed to the water for 
travel. Stimson brought the rifle to his shoulder, but 
there was nothing to aim at, nothing to see, only a 
noise in the dark. 

One of the puppies awoke and began to whine. 
Instantly there was a louder splashing and a crashing 
through the brush on our side of the river below the 
camp. Stimson began to chuckle as another noise 
reached our anxious ears. It was the sound of a dog 
shaking itself free of water. 

“ Bob,” gasped the captain, between snorts of mirth, 
“ it's the puppies* mother come after her babes. She 
has ” 

He was interrupted by another wail close to us, 
down the stream, a crescendo wail that ended in a sob. 
There were answering squeaks from the puppies, now 
excitedly squirming to leave me and respond to the 
call. It was convincing proof that the captain was 
right. 

“ What shall we do? ” I asked, anxiously. 

The mother dog heard the cries of her offspring and 
burst into excited barks. Fearing a charge upon the 
camp, Stimson raised the rifle, but the flaming fire was 
223 


Castaway Island 

better protection. The dog kept beyond the rim of its 
light. 

“ If you expect any sleep to-night, give her back her 
pups,” Stimson answered. “ The dog will howl all 
night long if she does nothing more dangerous.” 

“ Not all the puppies, Captain?” 

“ Well, we might try giving her two. She may for- 
get there were more than that when she left them.” 

“ But I had them all named — Rags, Tags and Jags.” 

“ Give her Jags, surely ; it’s a hard name to live up 
to ; and Tags, if you can tell them apart. I really 
think, Bobbin, that she is entitled to two of her litter. 
She has come a long way for them, trailing us by scent 
across the moor, she has swum the river and is ready 
to fight the two of us to get them back. What do you 
say ? ” 

“ I’ll do it,” I said, sadly enough. “ I haven’t 
really felt right since I took them, Captain, but they 
were so cute and companionable I hated to let them 
go. We will give her two now, and if she isn’t satis- 
fied, I’ll give her Rags.” 

I selected Rags from the three and thrust him into 
my blouse, giving Stimson Tags and Jags, and he took 
a burning faggot as a torch and carried them toward 
the shadows from whence had come the cries. I held 
the rifle ready, for I did not want Stimson eaten up by 
the mother in return for our generosity, but there was 
no danger. Perhaps she knew he was bringing back 
her family ; anyway, she did not make appearance, 
224 


I See a Strange Smoke 

and Stimson set the puppies down in an open spot in 
the moonlight well beyond the light of our fire, return- 
ing to me, and in a minute the whining of the puppies 
was quieted by a glad bark from the mother, then 
silence rested on the night. 

The excitement had made me forget my aches and, 
strangely enough, had quieted my tortured nerves and 
I went to sleep with my foot in the stiffening mud of 
the kelp. It was morning, and the paroquets were 
busily discussing our intrusion of the thicket when I 
opened my eyes. 

Stimson and the shotgun were missing and I knew 
he was seeking breakfast. Rags had broken out of 
prison in my blouse and was investigating a pheasant 
bone which had been thoroughly cleaned the previous 
evening. The sun shone brightly through the open- 
ings in the foliage and the river ran slowly and softly 
beside me. 

From the distance came the boom of the spatter gun. 
“ Breakfast, Rags ! " I cried, and the puppy made for 
me, climbing clumsily to my lap. I knew then that 
with Rags I should never fear when Stimson was 
away ; I had another companion. 

In a few minutes the captain came in bringing five 
bright plumaged birds about the size of wood-pigeons. 
“ I don't know what they are," he said, “ but they're 
breakfast. Bob, our island has more varieties of birds 
than I have seen any place I've been, and fewer va- 
rieties of wild animals. Except for the domestic beasts 
225 


Castaway Island 

gone wild and the turtles, we have seen one ocelot and 
a deer.” 

“ Might they, too, have been brought to the island ? ” 
I asked, helping him dress the birds. 

“ Possibly their ancestors were imported. The ocelot 
is made a pet in many parts of southern America, and 
the idea of propagating deer is understandable. I have 
found signs of rabbits or hares, and I am certain that 
there are pigs here, but the only thing we have yet 
found that we can be sure is indigenous to the island 
is the galapago. How does the foot feel ? ” 

“ As though it wasn’t there. I ache from the knee 
up, that’s all.” 

“ We’ll see how it’s coming after breakfast.” 

“ Then can we start for home ? ” 

Stimson laughed grimly. “ Bob,” he said, “ you’ll 
not be able to walk on that hoof for a week at least. 
I can’t carry you over the mountains or yet around the 
coast, so we are not going home just at present.” 

“ You might leave me here ” 

“ I might, but won’t,” the captain interrupted. 
“ There is one man on this island besides ourselves, 
maybe more. He fired a gun and took our raft. He 
hasn’t indicated any friendly disposition toward us so 
far, and he knows we’re here just as well as we know 
that he is, or was, here. Until I learn more about him, 
I’ll not leave you alone at all.” 

“ Could he be the Chinaman ? ” 

“ I have thought of that and it is quite possible. A 
226 


I See a Strange Smoke 

Chinese boat may be working the pearl oyster beds of 
Ostrich Bay and one of the fishermen may have wan- 
dered down the coast on a hunting trip. If you could 
travel, we’d soon find out, but we cannot take chances of 
their friendliness. They are not sociably inclined, I’m 
afraid. We’ll lie close for a time until your foot mends.” 

“ We never were poorer than we are right now,” I 
said, thinking of all the comforts and even luxuries of 
our farm on the lake. 

“ We’re rich, Bob, — rich ! ” cried Stimson, cheerily. 

“ We have powder and shot, water and fire, shade and 
baths, warm nights and food. Think of what we have, 
not what we haven’t.” 

We had breakfast then, evidence of Stimson’s theory 
of our wealth, broiled birds that tasted as well as they 
looked, washed down by the cool water from the river. 
While Rags cleared away the bones, growling in quite 
a grown-up manner, the captain made investigation of 
my wound. 

“ You are to close your eyes,” he commanded, “ and 
keep them tight shut until I say open. I am the doc- 
tor and I’m the only one who is to view the case.” I 
obeyed, and for a long half hour kept my eyes closed 
and my teeth tight clenched. If tears pushed through 
between my lids, no groan came from my lips. 

“ Open now,” finally said the captain, and I wiped 
my eyes on my sleeve, to find my foot all bound up in ; 
tapa cloth bandages torn from Stimson’s shirt. His 
face was pale, but his eyes were smiling. 

227 


Castaway Island 

“ It’s doing finely, Bob/' he said. “ The danger is 
past. Doesn’t it feel easier? ” 

“ You woke it into life again all right,” I answered, 
“ but it is quieting down now. It hurts less every 
minute.” 

“ The poison is gone, the germs are dead and all it 
has to do is heal. I have it wrapped in leaves that I 
know are soothing, and time is going to do the rest. 
Just make up your mind that this is the best place in 
the world to be, and it won’t take any time before you 
can leave it. In the meantime, suppose you fish.” 

“ Hand me a line and hook and I will,” I laughed, 
for I felt sure that his inventive genius could not 
master these necessities. He handed them to me, 
taking them from his pocket as I spoke. The line 
was a strong fiber of tapa and the hook was a thorn 
attached to a bit of the branch. 

“ I was all ready for you,” he laughed, “ even to 
bait. Now let me carry you to the river’s edge and 
you can show me what there is below the surface 
water.” 

I fished all the morning with fair success, catching 
several of the perch-like fish we had found in Comfort 
River and our lake, and Stimson sat by or hunted 
grubs for bait. I used a number of hooks, for 
they dulled easily and had to be replaced, and I lost 
more fish than I landed through the crudeness of the 
tackle ; but we had found a dinner that gave us variety, 
and we broiled fish on heated stones. Stimson found 
228 


I See a Strange Smoke 

berries, too, that were delicious, and our menu in- 
creased that afternoon by the addition of mussels. 
Down the river, where the tide of the sea offset the 
current, he found a rock almost covered with the 
molluscs. 

As the days passed, marking continued healing of 
my wound, Stimson used all his ingenuity to keep me 
from dullness and save the hours from monotony. He 
would lie on the ground beside me and tell me stories 
from his personal experiences that were as thrilling as 
any fiction I had ever read. He had begun life — 
grown life — at sixteen as a lumber-jack in the Michigan 
woods, when timber was a great business in the state 
and the running of logs full of hazards and excitement. 
Five years later he came west and became a cattle 
herder in Wyoming, and later sheriff of the county 
where he lived. The Spanish American war had 
started him soldiering, and at its close, which found 
him in the Philippines, he crossed to Manchuria and 
gave his services to the Japanese. Since then he had 
fought in several countries, sickening of war and its 
suffering, and I had seen the conclusion of his employ- 
ment as a soldier at Guayaquil. 

Into this rough outline had been crowded adventures, 
the relation of which made many an hour seem short 
and pleasant. Stimson was not inclined to talk of him- 
self, and I probably never would have learned so much 
regarding him had it not been for my wound and his 
desire to cheer me. 


229 


Castaway Island 

And I told him all about myself save the one thing 
I had decided to keep to myself, the fact that I was 
rich. It made so little difference anyway, and I was 
afraid that he might think it added to his responsibility 
for me. The fact that I came with him, roughing it on 
the “ Sally B,” he trying to save me the passage money 
home, might make him sorry that he let me, and I 
didn’t want him sorry. I was glad I had come, no 
matter the outcome, and I wanted him glad. So I 
neglected to tell him that there was a fortune, awaiting 
me to claim it, up in San Francisco. 

Our calendar, the log-book, was aboard the raft when 
it was stolen or drifted away, but I was keeping track 
of the days on a piece of stick, cutting notches as 
Robinson Crusoe did. It was a Sunday, marked by a 
cross, and we had been beside the river four days when 
we saw horses again and Stimson had his inspiration. 
A band of eight, coming a new way to water, passed 
within a hundred yards of us without discovering our 
presence. When they had drunk their fill at the river 
and trotted away, Stimson came to his feet with a 
bound. 

“ Bobbin,” he said, speaking low but excitedly, 
“ I’m going to get you a horse and take you home to 
Lake Plentiful.” 

“ Fine ! ” I answered. “ How? ” I asked. 

“ Ever hear of creasing a horse ? ” 

I shook my head. “ Well, Bob, it’s a method seldom 
used, because it is about the most hazardous manner of 
230 


I See a Strange Smoke 

capturing a horse that could be. If you don't get your 
horse, you kill it, but I have seen it done on the Pampas 
in Argentine. You shoot them." 

“ Cripple them so they can't get away ? " 

“ No. There is a spot at the base of the neck where 
a rifle bullet will paralyze temporarily, but leave no 
permanent ill effects. It has to be careful shooting, 
because an inch either way will probably kill the horse. 
I never tried it, but I know the spot, and I may be able 
to get one horse out of two or three attempts." 

“ If you did crease one, should I be able to ride it ? " 
I asked. “ I am not a bronco buster, even when my 
foot is well." 

“ You have ridden, though ? " 

“ Yes, kindly tempered horses on city streets. I can 
ride fairly well with a saddle under me, and stay on 
when there isn’t a saddle, provided the horse is agree- 
able." 

“ Then don’t worry about that. If I capture the 
horse, I can break it for you. I’ll be off at daybreak 
to-morrow, so don’t wonder where I am when you 
wake up." 

He was away when I woke up next morning, but he 
did not return riding a horse. Instead he brought 
back the shell and most of the meat of a galapago, 
captured and killed by him with a club, not creased. 
He explained that he had found a runway to the river 
where the horses were habitually going to drink, but 
too late to serve him that day, and coming back up 

231 


Castaway Island 

the stream had encountered the turtle. He had turned 
it on its back and killed it without difficulty. Where 
it had been, he dug from the sand sixteen eggs. 

We had turtle eggs for breakfast, roasted, and they 
were good eating. We had turtle meat for dinner and^ 
it was tender and juicy, although memory took away 
some of my relish of it. I never shall like turtle meat. 

The next morning I was awakened at daylight by 
Stimson’s effort to make a quiet departure and not 
awaken me. “ I would give a Buddha pearl for a cup 
of hot coffee,” he said, when he found I was awake. 

“ Get the horse and we’ll go back to coffee with 
cream and sugar ; also hot cakes and butter, bananas 
and breadfruit, pineapples and such. Does your mouth 
water? ” 

“ It does. What do We have for breakfast, Bob ? ” 

“ Turtle eggs, boiled.” 

“ Boiled ? What in ? ” 

“ Never you mind. You are to crease a horse and 
I am to boil eggs. Don’t imagine you have all the 
inventive genius in camp, Captain. I have an idea 
now and then myself.” 

He grinned as he took the rifle and went down the 
stream in the dim light of dawn and I began limping 
around in my preparations to make good my boast of 
boiled eggs. We had but two ways of cooking in 
camp up to now, broiling over the coals or baking 
under them, for there was not a single utensil of any 
kind. It was the turtle’s shell which gave me the 
232 


I See a Strange Smoke 

idea. Of coarse it would not long stand the heat of 
a fire beneath it, but might not water be brought to a 
boil in it some other way ? 

I made up a large fire and in the heart of it placed 
stones brought from the river bed ; then I placed 
enough water in the shell to cover the eggs and the 
stones I intended should do the heating. I made a 
pair of tongs from green wood, to carry the stones 
from the fire to the shell, and I waited for the stones 
to heat. 

I heard Stimson’s rifle crack in the far distance and 
felt the excitement of a great hope of success. If he 
had landed his bullet in the proper spot we might 
start back home that day, and I was homesick for our 
farm. I hobbled to the edge of the thicket and looked 
across the plain, trusting to see some sign of him, but 
there was nothing down the river. The sun was rising 
over the hills in the east; to the west were the hills 
that made the wide moor to the sea. Above the sky- 
line, in one place, there arose what I thought at first 
was a cloud of dust. I watched it eagerly, believing 
it might be the horses, trusting one was down, but 
there was no shifting of the dust. It was not dust. 
As the sun struck it, it became white, not yellow. It 
was smoke, the smoke of a fire beyond the edge of 
the hill. 

It could not be Stimson. He had gone in another 
direction, and he had no way to build a fire if he 
wanted one. I went back to camp, knowing that there 
233 


Castaway Island 

were other people out on the moor between us and the 
sea. 

The stones in the fire were almost red hot, and I 
dropped them carefully, one by one, into the tortoise 
shell. The water steamed, then bubbled and boiled. 
I had found a way to cook, and the captain did not 
tell me ; out of my own head I had evolved a scheme 
that bettered our condition and made life pleasanter. 

Stimson came breaking through the brush just as I 
was ready with boiled eggs — a trifle too well done for 
breakfast, perhaps, but piping hot and a change of the 
menu. He shook his head in negation of my question 
before it was spoken. “ Killed a horse,” he said un- 
smilingly. “ Missed the spot, Bob, and killed the 
poor beast.” 

“ Not the black stallion ? ” I asked, quickly. 

“ No. Didn’t see him. A bay.” 

“ Never mind, Captain. Eat your breakfast,” and I 
grinned at the look of astonishment that came to his 
face as he saw the boiled eggs. 

“How did you do that, Bob?” he asked, and he 
gave me praise for my ingenuity when I had ex- 
plained. “ I never thought of it,” he said. 

I told him of the smoke cloud in the hills, asking 
if he had seen it, but it was outside the range of his 
trip. He was worried over it and as soon as we fin- 
ished breakfast had me lead him to the place I had 
been and point out where it had shown on the sky- 
line, for it was not there now. He estimated the dis- 
234 


I See a Strange Smoke 

tance at five miles and doubted that his shot had been 
heard. “ Still, they may have seen the smoke of our 
fire as you saw theirs," he said, “ or even the blaze of 
it last night. If I dared leave you, Bob, I'd scout 
about over there and find out who and what they are, 
but I dare not take the chance. They may be scout- 
ing for our camp. Could you make out to hobble a 
few miles if I build you a crutch ? " 

“ The foot is fine, Captain. I'll get along." 

“ Then we change our camp to-day, Bob. Come on," 
and we hurried back to the river. 


235 



CHAPTER XIX 
A COWARD’S SHOT 

T HE crotch of a branch under my arm, my tortoise- 
shell boiler tied to my back and Rags in my 
blouse, I fell in behind Stimson, laden with the rest of 
our slight camp equipage. We were going up the 
river, not because it was good strategy, but because we 
were in no condition to go down-stream. 

“ If they’re looking for us,” explained Stimson, 
“ they ” referring to whatever caused the smoke on the 
moor, stole our raft and fired a gun in the night, 
“ they’ll hunt for us up-stream because that is the 
direction of fresh water, so we should go down to fool 
them. But we can’t carry sufficient water with us to 
last, and I am not certain enough that we’re being 
hunted to want to risk thirst. We’ll hide out beside 
the fresh water, Bob.” 


236 


A Coward’s Shot 


The early part of our journey was easy traveling, for 
the river ran sluggishly between low plains that were 
often marsh-land, but by making detours we could 
keep to the solid ground and free from the jungle-like 
thicket of the bank. Stimson carried the two guns, 
and around his waist was wound a hide rope that he 
had cut from the skin of the wild horse shot that 
morning. At each turn of the river’s course we fright- 
ened up flocks of water-fowl, but we were not anxious 
to increase our burdens or indicate the direction of our 
flight by firing the gun. 

After an hour or so we began to climb. The rolling 
moor had reached the foot-hills and we soon came to a 
place where the river, now narrow but deep, ran 
through a canyon which was impassable. We took to 
the hillside, a hundred feet above the water, and our 
progress became a succession of short advances and long 
rests. My foot was not yet strong enough for mountain 
climbing and the crutch helped but little. It was 
Stimson’s strong arm about me that kept me going 
forward at all. 

For another stretch of time that seemed interminable, 
we climbed and rested, climbed and rested, then climbed 
again, until turning around a rocky crag we came sud- 
denly out upon a plateau that overlooked the sea to 
east and south. It was a strange break in the ragged 
range of hills. In contrast with what we had passed 
through, the arid moors and the rock bluffs, it was 
fertile, covered with a long, harsh grass. Irregular in 

237 


Castaway Island 

the contour of its area, we could see but a small part of 
it, sparsely set with dwarfed, misshapen trees, like oaks 
that grow against the pressure of strong winds. 

We came upon this unexpected stretch of grateful 
green after the hardest stretch of climbing on the 
journey and for a few minutes we looked across it with 
the pleasure of its freshness and vivid color in contrast 
with the hot rocks we clambered across to reach it. 
Almost simultaneously Stimson and I saw a herd of 
horses at its farther side and the captain drew me 
down into the grass beside him. 

“ This is the summer pasture of the island, Bob,” 
whispered Stimson. “ I have wondered where the 
live stock found feed during the dry spell.” 

“ Why is it so much greener here ? ” I asked, in the 
same cautious manner. 

“ The explanation is over there.” Stimson pointed 
out to sea where a fog bank was slowly rolling in. 
“ There is some kink in the mountain formation here 
that catches the fogs, and they water this flat.” 

“ Are you going to crease a horse?” I asked, looking 
again at the herd still feeding undisturbed in the 
distance. 

“ Fm going to try to stalk them,” Stimson replied, 
handing me the shotgun and looking carefully to his 
rifle sights. “ You stay here and I'll try antelope 
hunting on them. There’s just a bare chance that L 
get within range.” 

“ They are feeding toward us.” 

238 


A Coward’s Shot 


“ But the fog will be in before they get within range. 
I must go to them if I want a shot. Stay here and lie 
low.” 

Crouching so that only the top of his head was above 
the grass, Stimson ran forward, his eyes on the horses, 1 
then dropped like a flash. One of them had seen him 
or his movement in the grass, for it threw up its head 
with a startled whinny. The other animals ceased 
feeding and all looked toward him and I expected the 
next second they would kick hoofs in air and fly. 
They sniffed the air, moved uneasily, huddling closer 
together, but they remained and Stimson lay prone 
without motion. Convinced that there was some mis- 
take in the warning, the animals began again to feed. 

Through the tops of the waving grass I saw Stimson 
take another spurt forward, gaining a hundred yards 
before he dropped like a shot. The horses were ex- 
tremely uneasy now. With heads held high, whiffing 
the wind, they started away, then halted and came 
back. It was a strange movement, for I was certain 
they had intended to fly. Something had stopped 
them, something called them back. 

Raising my head higher, I saw what it was. Above 
the grass where Stimson lay concealed waved a bright 
red bit of cloth which I knew was the remnant of the 
captain's bandana. Slowly, rhythmically, it moved 
back and forth, and step by step the horses approached 
it. Curiosity was proving stronger than their fears. 

It was a breathless time for me watching there. The 
239 


Castaway Island 

horses stopped their slow advance beside a clump of 
trees, bunching together ready to fly, and I expected to 
hear the crack of Stimson’s rifle. Instead the red rag 
waved again closer to the startled animals. Stimson 
had made another running gain. Now he flirted with 
their curiosity not a hundred yards away. 

He would surely fire now, I thought, but minute 
after minute went by, the animals advancing and paus- 
ing, the flag slowly waving. Then it suddenly fell and 
I heard a shrill scream from the captain. The head of 
every horse was thrown high in air ; there was an 
instant of suspense, then the rifle spoke. One horse 
dropped like a stone. The rest were gone in a cloud 
of dust. 

Jumping to my feet, I hobbled on my crutch as 
swiftly as I might to where the captain was now beside 
the fallen horse. He did not look up at my approach, 
but was binding rawhide ropes to both fore and hind 
feet of the animal, short ropes for hobbles. A slip 
noose was placed over the head about the throat, Stim- 
son testing its strength with care as he uncoiled it. 
The other end of the rope he snubbed about the trunk 
of a tree. 

“ Bad place for horse breaking, Bobbin,” he said to 
me, working with speed and sureness. “Too many 
trees. If he doesn’t beat my brains out he may his 
own.” 

“ Take care of yourself, Captain,” I cried anxiously. 
The horse was getting to its feet, first sitting on its 
240 


A Coward’s Shot 


haunches and shaking the numbness from its head, 
then with a leap in the air landing on all four legs. 
For just an instant he stood still while Stimson hauled 
in the slack of the rawhide, then away he went cavort- 
ing and bucking, brandishing his hobbled hoofs, 
pitching forward and back, trying to break from the 
cords and the rope. Stimson held at the rope’s end, 
watching it for weaknesses rather than the struggling 
horse. 

It was not a wide circle that limited the struggle, 
for the lariat was short, but Stimson reduced the size, 
bringing the horse closer in until he could place a hand 
lightly on the stallion’s neck, a proceeding that pre- 
cipitated another fierce battle. If the horse had not 
been affected by the blow of the bullet, the encounter 
between man and horse might have been longer and 
more serious. As it was, it kept my heart in my throat 
for half an hour. Stimson gave him but little head- 
way, fearing his plunges among the trees and rocks, 
holding him by a shortened rope and keeping well out 
of the way of his vicious teeth and hoofs. Finally he 
muzzled him with a twist of the line about jaw and 
nostrils, all the while patting him softly and speaking 
to him with gentle command in his tones. 

When I saw Stimson loosen the hitch around the 
tree, I believed that the struggle was over, but I was 
mistaken. It was preliminary to an attempt to get the 
stallion into better training grounds, beyond the trees, 
and neither horse nor Stimson had any idea of giving 
241 


Castaway Island 

over the battle. With the loosening of the lariat, the 
horse made a lunge for it, and the captain was dragged 
for a rod or more, digging his feet into the turf and 
holding back with all his strength and weight. Had 
he not been able to take advantage of another tree 
trunk, snubbing the rope about it, I believe the stallion 
would have escaped. 

They were more than an hour going the short dis- 
tance to the clear plain beyond the trees, but it was 
finally won, and Stimson assumed the aggressive. 
Here was room to work, room to throw kinks in the 
rope that would catch a leg in a snare and trip the 
stallion to his knees. It was wonderful lariat han- 
dling, and the horse, already tired from its struggling, 
became each minute more subdued and tractable. 
Each time Stimson threw the horse he closed in on 
him, fondling and talking to him softly as though the 
animal could understand. 

At last the stallion stood, shaking in every limb, and 
allowed the captain to wipe from his glossy sides the 
foam and perspiration of the struggle, and Stimson cut 
loose the hobbles. Then came the last test of strength. 
Taking advantage of the freedom of his limbs the 
stallion started a run which lasted but an instant, for 
the captain had expected it and was prepared with a 
cunning twist of the rope which threw the animal 
heavily to his side, where he la}^ panting and exhausted. 
Stimson, lying across him, holding his head down, 
thrust a piece of the rope as a bit between the jaws, 
242 


A Coward’s Shot 


making it fast behind the ears and under the mouth, 
a crude bridle ; then he loosened the noose that had 
cut off the horse’s wind and urged the animal to rise. 
The minute it was on its feet Stimson was across its 
back, heels gripping at the sides, one hand wound in 
a lock of the mane, the other taut on the bridle rein. 

There was a minute or two of plunging and bucking, 
but the captain had known horses that bucked harder 
and with better knowledge of the subject, and he stuck 
like a burr. The stallion changed tactics and ran. 
Stimson let him run, knowing that he would soon 
tire ; and somehow he guided him, circling about the 
plain, keeping clear of the trees and rocks. After a 
time the horse would have quieted to a trot, but Stim- 
son began the urging, forcing him to a gallop each 
time he showed desire to stop. The battle was over 
and Stimson had won. He rode up to me, the horse 
quivering at the proximity but obedient, and jumping 
to the ground, placed the rope in my hand. 

“ Here, Bobbin,” he said, “ is a fairly tractable riding 
horse for you. Treat him right and he’ll soon eat out 
of your hand.” 

“ For me, Captain ? ” I gasped. 

“ Sure, lad. I own a black stallion, still free on the 
plains. This bay horse is yours, and to-morrow you 
shall ride, not walk.” 

“ I’ll try it,” I said dubiously, for I held no convic- 
tion of my ability to stay a minute on his back, and I 
led the bay stallion to the cliff beside the river from 

243 


Castaway Island 

whence we had first seen him. Here, hobbled and at 
the end of a tether, he was allowed to recover from his 
efforts and soon was eating grass as comfortably as 
though free. 

Because the fog had crept in like a white veil, shut- 
ting off extended view and blotting out the sun, we 
made camp at once and had a cold supper of the turtle 
meat, for there was no way of lighting a fire in the 
mist. Stimson, taking the turtle shell, climbed down 
to the stream for water. As was his custom always, he 
carried the rifle, and a moment later when I heard a 
shot I had no other thought than that he had fired and 
wondered what had caused him to sacrifice a cartridge. 

When he climbed over the brow of the cliff I knew 
he had not shot, for the rifle still hung in its sling 
over his shoulder and both hands were occupied 
with the tortoise shell. There was a troubled look on 
his face, too, a warning in his eyes, and his lips were 
pursed in a dumb caution to silence. I grasped the 
shotgun and crept to meet him. 

“ Drink — drink all you can,” he whispered, and I 
saw then that the shell receptacle was leaking. Al- 
though Stimson’s thumb covered the hole, water was 
oozing away through a long crack that ran from the 
bullet’s entrance. I placed my lips to the shell’s edge 
and drank my fill. 

Dropping the now useless receptacle, Stimson, pushing 
me before him, hurried through the grass along the 
rim of the bluffs, running with his head turned back 
244 


A Coward’s Shot 


to see what followed, covering my body with his own, 
lifting me when I stumbled, urging me in whispers to 
keep up and go forward. For a hundred yards we ran 
and hobbled through the fog, then Stimson sank to the 
ground, pressed me down beside him and started squirm— 
ing through the grass at right angles to the line of 
our flight. 

By a pressure of his hand on my arm, he signaled 
me to stop and crept alongside, unslinging the rifle 
and quickly loading it. Cautiously he raised his head 
above the grass tops, and for a long time studied the 
murky, fog-enshrouded landscape, then sank back be- 
side me. 

“ We’ve dodged them,” he whispered, “ thanks to 
the fog. How do you like being the game at the hunt, 
Bob?” 

“ Who is hunting us ? ” I asked in reply. 

“ Jiminetty ! I wish I knew ! A musket slug 
through the turtle shell is the evidence of intention, 
and it was aimed at me, not the shell.” 

“ You didn’t see who fired the shot? ” 

“ Not even the smoke of a gun. A coward’s shot 
from ambush.” 

“ Were there more than one? ” 

“ Yes. I do not believe one man would dare the 
chance, for you were armed, even if he had killed me. 
Two or maybe more of them, I’m sure.” 

“ But why ? ” 

“ We must find out, Bob. We must know who they 
245 


Castaway Island 

are and why they are hostile, but the first thing is to 
get back to our hut on the lake where we can make 
ourselves safe and secure. Now try to sleep, Bob.” 

Night had fallen and soon the fog thinned away on 
a breeze from the east and stars began to show above 
us. Snuggling close to Stimson I lay and watched 
them come out from the mist and I did my best to 
forget this new element of danger, but the thought 
persisted. Here was I like the pheasant I had wounded 
a few days before, hiding in the grass, seeking conceal- 
ing shelter from the hunter. We were no longer the 
hunters, but the hunted. 

Hours passed with desperate slowness and the moon 
came up above the crags of the mountains to the east. 
The captain was asleep, I knew, for his breath came 
and went with slow regularity, and my e}^es, tired with 
staring at the skies, closed in weariness. Then the 
stallion whinnied, startled. 

I shook Stimson awake. “ The horse ! ” I whispered. 
“ Listen I ” 

We could hear its frightened snorting, the trampling 
of hoofs. 

“ They shan't steal the horse ! ” Stimson breathed 
indignantly, snatching the rifle. “ Wait here, Bob,” 
^and began a crouched run through the grass, disap- 
pearing in an instant from my view. A long delay 
while my heart beat suffocatingly, then a whinny of 
recognition from the stallion, and I knew the captain 
was there. Another time of absolute quiet that 
246 



HE WAS WITHIN EASY RANGE 





























































































A Coward’s Shot 


seemed interminable. I raised my eyes cautiously 
above the line of the grass and looked toward where 
the horse was concealed, but there was only the grass 
and rocks and trees touched by the moon’s rays and 
the blackness of their shadows beneath. As I lowered 
my head, some movement behind me caused my eyes 
to turn over my shoulder, and I saw a figure glide from 
the shadow of a rock at the edge of the stream and 
step into the moonlight. 

It was a man. In the half minute he stood there I 
saw him plainly, for he was not a hundred feet away 
and his face was toward the moon. He was dark, 
swarthy, black of hair, and his muscular body was 
bare of clothes. On his head was a cloth or turban 
and there were rings in his ears that glittered in the 
moonlight. He raised his hand above his head to the 
full length of his arm, held it there a moment, then 
dropped it, a signal to some one I could not see ; and 
he melted again into the shadow. 

I was sure he had not seen me, knew nothing of my 
presence there, for he was within easy range of the 
rifle, even the shotgun which I held loaded with shot 
and slugs. I could have wounded him, perhaps killed 
him, had I wished and my aim been steady enough, 
and I wondered if Stimson might not have done so. 

It was too late to answer the question practically, for 
he was gone ; but I knew the answer so far as I was 
concerned. I could not have shot him as he stood 
there, apparently unarmed, doing no immediate harm 
247 


Castaway Island 

or injury to any one. That he was harmful, danger- 
ous, ominous, a continual threat to our lives, I knew, 
but he was not a wild beast. I might kill a jaguar 
or a wild dog without a pang, but I could not shoot a 
man, except to save my life or the captain's. 

A rustling of the grass close beside me brought the 
shotgun up ready for use, but it was Stimson who 
crept out of its tangle. “ All right, Bob," he whis- 
pered. “ I've moved the horse into the clump of trees 
where we downed him, and we'll join him there." 

“ Wait," I answered, and I told him what I had seen. 
He made me go over my description of the man. 

“ Brown skin, black hair," Stimson repeated 
after me. “ Then he is not Chinese, and my theory of 
the pearl fishers is wrong. The turban and earrings 
suggest East India, but why and how here in the 
Galapagos ? He might be Ecuadoran, but that would 
indicate at least a shirt ; Kanaka — wouldn’t have the 
turban. I give it up, Bob. Come along," and we 
crawled on hands and knees to the deep shadows of 
the clump of trees where the stallion, muzzled by a 
piece of tapa cloth that he might not discover our 
position to the lurkers, was tied to a tree. Beside him, 
we lay down and again tried to sleep. A long hour 
later I whispered sleepily, “ Captain ? " 

44 Yes, Bob." 

44 I'll call him Dan." 

“ Call who Dan ? " 

“ My horse," and I fell asleep. 

248 



CHAPTER XX 

INVADERS OF THE VALLEY 

I T seemed but a minute later when Stimson awoke 
me, his fingers over my lips that I might make no 
sound. It was dark night yet, although there was the 
first indication of dawn in the east, and we prepared 
without delay to leave the sheltering clump of trees. 
Dan had objections to my mounting him, and I 
thought we must go through another struggle of 
breaking him, but Stimson's voice had a wonderfully 
soothing effect, and he cajoled the stallion into allow- 
ing me upon his back. 

With Stimson leading Dan and Rags and I riding, 
we passed out of the little grove on its farther side, 
heading away from the stream in a northwesterly di- 
rection. When the sun burst into life, we had made 
several miles and the crags that indicated the river 
canyon were not even in sight from the rises, on one 
249 


Castaway Island 

of which we paused to make careful survey of the 
ground we had traversed looking for a sign of fol- 
lowers. After a long scrutiny Stimson spoke aloud for 
the first time. “ We’ve left them behind, Bob,” he 
said. “ Either we have given them the slip or they’re 
staying by the stream expecting us to return to it. 
There is no chance for concealment here.” 

“ But we shall have to get back to water?” It was 
less a question than a statement of the fact that I was 
already thirsty, that the sun had been effective in its 
parching work. 

“A little dry, Bob?” laughed the captain, and at 
my nod he started Dan on our way over the plain, 
which was already sending heat waves upward toward 
the blistering sun. “ It won’t be bothering you long. 
In an hour or so you’ll be damp enough to feel un- 
comfortable.” 

Stimson was only exaggerating the length of time, 
for the fog began blowing in from the east in half an 
hour, and we were traveling through a gray mist that 
was almost rain. I let my tongue hang out of my up- 
turned mouth and felt the soothing moisture seep into 
my system. I grew hungry but was no longer thirsty, 
and I knew that I could stand lack of food without 
complaint. The fog gave us security from pursuit, 
too, and we traveled by the compass until late in the 
afternoon, when Stimson made a turn at right angles, 
heading northeast. 

We were upon a rocky plateau at the time, with 
250 


Invaders of the Valley 

scarcely any grass or plant life to break the monotony 
of boulders and volcanic dust. For some time before 
this abrupt change in our direction, I had noticed 
Stimson studying our trail. Twice he had gone back 
considerable distances over our path, looking at the 
ground. Now he explained his actions. “ If we are 
being trailed/’ he said, “ which is likely enough, they’re 
going to miss it here. In this ash dust our trail dis- 
appears with the first wind that stirs it. I have been 
in volcanic countries before, Bob, and I’ve tried to 
hunt deer in the ash, but there isn’t a hope of trailing. 
It’s too light and soft to hold a footprint. If they’re 
following us, they have lost us before this, but because 
of the general direction of our trail since we started, 
they’ll think we are headed for Ostrich Bay. That’s 
the impression I have tried to give them. Now we’re 
going to put all the night into a hike over the moun- 
tains to Lake Plentiful. We’ll try to have breakfast 
at home, Bob.” 

No words could have sounded pleasanter in my ears, 
and my hunger grew less in the knowledge that we 
were headed toward food and comfort. I had never 
in my life been so homesick as I was then to be back 
in our nipa roofed hut on Lake Plentiful. Stimson 
urged Dan into a willing trot, he running beside him, 
his hand grasping the mane, relieving the strain of the 
pace. 

Finally we came to the river canyon and Stimson 
found a trail down to the water. He was risking a 
251 


Castaway Island 

chance of our being discovered, but the fog was still 
dense, and unless we had the ill luck to run into our 
pursuers, they could not see us. We all had a drink 
of the clear, cold water, Dan, Rags, the captain and I, 
and we had a general cleaning up of dust and dirt. It 
was a greatly refreshed group of men and animals that 
resumed the journey. 

Because the eastern bank of the river was here a 
precipitous crag that towered into the fog, we pushed 
our way up the river bottom, going slowly and care- 
fully because of the loose rocks and treacherous holes 
in the bed of the stream. Stimson was anxious to get 
away from the stream, having a fear that one or more 
of our pursuers might be concealed in its windings, and 
kept his eyes bent upon the left bank for a possible 
climbing place, but for a mile no chance appeared. 
Then, coming in from the north, was a branch of the 
main stream, smaller and more turbulent, and we be- 
gan climbing to its source. 

“ If night falls with us in this canyon,” Stimson 
said, “ it is good-bye to our hopes of getting breakfast 
at home. Well have to camp out and wait for light.” 

“ Can't we break out to right or left ? ” I asked, for 
even the thought of another night out was bitter to me. 

“ Keep your eyes open for that chance, Bob, and no 
matter how slight, wtell take it.” 

It came in a few minutes, and it needed no dis-, 
coverer. At the top of the steepest rise we had struck, 
where the stream made a waterfall of nearly a hundred 
252 


Invaders of the Valley 

feet, and we had to struggle up a zigzag way, foot by 
foot, Dan, good little mountain horse that he was, keep- 
ing his legs beneath him with masterly skill, there was 
a wooded glade where the sun was shining. It was a 
sunset radiance, dispelling the fog, and it came through 
a great fissure in the mountain, and out there were the 
rolling waters of the ocean, and, nearer by, the surf line 
of the shore of Ostrich Bay. I felt that we were nearly 
home, so long had the time seemed since we sailed 
away from the oyster beds. 

Stimson, however, was not looking at the sea or 
shore. His eyes were upon the two peaks that reared 
at either side of the fissure in the mountain. “ I’ve 
seen those before," he said, pointing to draw my atten- 
tion. “ Remember them, Bob? ” 

“ When we were at Ostrich Bay ? " I asked, guessing, 
for they brought no recollection to mind. 

“ No. You've seen them a score of times. Look 
again." 

I gazed hard at them. “ Why, Captain, they're not 
— they are ! They're the peaks we see from home — 
back of the grove on Lake Plentiful." 

“ Correct ! We're seeing them from the other side 
now, and that makes a difference. Bob, we will be 
looking down on our own lake when the moon comes up 
to-night, or I miss my guess. On, on, lad ! Giddap, 
Dan ! " 

It was not the end of our difficulties, but the travel- 
ing was much easier than in the creek bottom, and we 
253 


Castaway Island 

made good time even after night fell. There was a 
pass between the source of the stream we had climbed 
and the beginning of the south fork of Comfort Creek, 
which was not more than two miles away, and we 
skirted the edge of the double peaks without having to 
climb them. When it became too dark to travel, we 
were descending the mountain, and we made a rough 
camp and waited for the moon to rise. 

Except for one or two short rests, Stimson had been 
walking and running since daylight and I had been 
astride Dan’s back, none too easy riding either, with- 
out a saddle ; and we had slept hardly at all the night 
before. So it is no wonder that we fell asleep waiting 
for the late moon, nor are we to be blamed that we did 
not wake up until the sun shone hot in our faces, after 
eight o’clock next morning. I was the first to stir, for 
Rags was licking my hand, and I awoke the captain. 
“ Moon’s up ! ” I cried to him, and laughed as his eyes 
opened to the sun. 

“ I’m a pretty one ! ” he declared in disgust. “ I 
certainly am getting lazy. We should be down there 
eating breakfast right now,” and he pointed to where 
the lake cast back a golden reflection of the sun’s glow. 

“ Never mind, Captain ; we’ll eat dinner there, any- 
way. I’m not as hungry now as I was last night. 
Shall I get Dan ? ” 

“ See if he’ll let you.” Stimson had hobbled Dan 
and staked him out where he might graze in the inter- 
val of the moon’s rising. 


254 


Invaders of the Valley 

I went toward the horse, talking to him as Stimson 
did, but he was not yet ready to recognize my authority. 
He backed away to the end of the rope, and I feared 
would go farther, taking a remnant of the line with, 
him if I persisted, so I had to call Stimson to help. 
He walked up to Dan and patted him, and Dan liked 
it ; and again Stimson introduced me to my own horse, 
letting Dan smell me all over. 

“ Isn’t it strange he still fears me ? ” I asked, but 
Stimson explained it as the odor of Rags upon me. 

“ Dan smells the dog, and dogs are not so friendly here 
as they are in civilized stables. We must have Dan and 
Rags friends, then your horse will take kindly to you.” 

Rags had no objections to being nosed by Dan and, 
after several jumps and snorts, the bay stallion decided 
the puppy was not going to eat him, and we all became 
friends. It was the last time that Dan was afraid of 
me, ever. 

It was early in the afternoon when we struck the end 
of Lake Plentiful, down by the bamboo swamp, and the 
rest of the distance was a canter along the beach. I 
was the only one of the four who could not run and 
frolic, but, perched on Dan, I let my heart gallop 
happily as the familiar landmarks came into view. 
There was the grove, and at its edge, grazing con- 
tentedly, were the cow and calf ; and how the calf had 
grown ! They looked up at us in startled surprise, 
then resumed feeding. We could see the hut now, its 
door closed as we had left it, its stone chimney smoke- 
255 


Castaway Island 

less. That was reassurance to us, for we had held a fear 
that it might not be a tenantless house. 

Out on the lake was the duck family, father, mother 
and three youthful ducklings. Behind the stable, 
pecking briskly, was our flock of chickens, augmented 
by several wild fowls that flew away at our approach, 
shy of humankind. The gorgeous plumaged guan 
and his modest tinted mate sat side by side on the 
stable roof. It was all just as though we had not been 
away at all. 

The first thing was food. We had not had a bite to 
eat, Stimson and Rags and I, since supper two days 
before, a matter of more than forty hours, and our last 
meal had been cold turtle and not enough of that. 
While I started a fire and beat up pancake batter, the 
captain killed a couple of young cockerels and gathered 
his arms full of fruit, and we had a real dinner. Rags 
stuffed himself until he was almost as round as a ball. 

I might have completely forgotten the menace of 
other human beings on the island in the comforts and 
friendships of our farmyard of domesticated animals 
had not Stimson mentioned it that evening as we sat 
before the cheerful blaze in the fireplace. “ Bob,” he 
said, “ we’ll have to go at sentry duty at once. I 
should like to risk their not locating us to-night, for 
we both need sleep ; but I do not dare. If we dodged 
them yesterday, as I believe we did, it is only a matter 
of hours when they discover us again. So you take the 
first watch until midnight and I’ll sleep now.” 


Invaders of the Valley 

“ You’ll have the late watch again, Captain. That 
isn’t fair.” 

“ I should not allow you on sentry duty at all with 
your wound, but we’re short handed in this regiment, 
Bob, so you will have to take your turn.” 

“ I’m able and willing. Give me my orders, Cap- 
tain.” I raised my hand to my forehead in a military 
' salute as I had seen the soldiers do in Guayaquil, and 
Stimson laughed. 

“ Your stand is before the cabin door. You will be 
armed with the rifle, loaded and cocked. You will 
keep watch up and down the lake and keep your ears 
open in every direction. Should there be any unusual 
disturbance either among our own animals or the birds 
of the forest, you will awaken me at once. Should 
you see any skulkers, men, not animals, you will fire 
once in the air, reload, then wait for me, unless you 
are attacked or fired upon. In such a case, shoot to 
kill.” The captain’s order, which had begun as a 
pleasantry, ended grimly enough. 

“ Shoot to kill ? ” I asked, repeating the phrase. 

“ Yes, Bob. Our lives are here in our own keeping, 
under God’s law. I fear that men without respect for 
His law have come upon this island, and it is our duty 
to protect ourselves. If we are attacked, we will kill.” 

I went to my position soberly enough, closing the 
door behind me, shutting out the pleasant firelight and 
reassurance of the captain’s presence. I felt very much 
alone in the darkness. A short distance before the 
257 


Castaway Island 

door was a tall palm tree and I took position at its 
base, leaning against the trunk to ease my foot. I 
dared not sit down for fear of falling asleep, and for 
the three hours of my watch kept my eyes and ears 
alert for any undue sight or sound. Probably because 
I had been through real dangers, I felt no fear of the 
starlit night, only a sense of loneliness and the dreari- 
ness of the waiting. 

At midnight I called Stimson and rolled into my 
bunk without waiting to undress, nor did I lie awake 
a minute after he had left me. The next I knew it 
was morning. 

Stimson was much fatigued and immediately after 
breakfast went to sleep, leaving me on guard. For the 
daylight sentry post we selected a tree at the edge of 
the grove from the lower branch of which we had an 
extended view up and down and across the lake as well 
as the hills behind the grove and beyond Roaring 
River. During the morning watch I began the educa- 
tion of Rags, for I foresaw many advantages in a prop- 
erly schooled watch-dog. 

I decided to teach him none of the house-pet tricks 
of standing on hind legs, speaking for cake, rolling over 
and being “ dead dog.” Such antics, while amusing, 
would be of little value in the Galapagos Islands. Rags 
should learn to follow at heel, to advance or fall back at 
command, to fetch or retrieve, to attack if desired, and 
he should learn to hunt if he was that kind of a dog. 

Just what kind of a dog Rags was I did not know 
258 


Invaders of the Valley 

and it seemed hard to guess. He was probably two 
months old and I judged him a rather well-sized pup 
for his age. If, as was quite likely, his father or 
mother or both were the attackers of the black stallion, 
I could have an idea of what he might look like when 
he arrived at a lookable age, for they had been similar 
to the two dogs we had first seen, short, wiry haired, 
looking a bit like deerhounds with collie blood some- 
where in their ancestry. 

I had brought several pieces of meat with me from 
the house as rewards of meritorious conduct in Rags 
and I began operations with the “ Fetch it ” trick, 
throwing a stick for Rags to return to me. I spent all 
that watch, between times in the tree crotch, getting 
Rags to take an interest in the stick at all, to make 
him realize that the stick had to do with him and his 
education. I might throw it near or far and the puppy 
did not care a particle, except to dodge out of its way 
if it threatened to hit him. My commands had no 
meaning to him ; my actions were not understandable. 
I found out that education must begin at the very 
foundation with a wild dog, and that it would mean 
the exercise of all the ingenuity and patience I pos- 
sessed to get over the foundation stones. 

Rags earned his first bit of meat when he took the 
stick between his teeth at my command. When Stim- 
son relieved me at noon, the puppy would take the 
stick in his mouth at my order about once in five 
times. And Stimson said I was doing finely ! 

259 


Castaway Island 

It was during the captain’s watch that we first knew 
that we had been followed into our valley. He brought 
me the information with instructions to drive Dan and 
the cattle into the center of the grove and picket them 
there, then rejoin him at the sentinel tree. It must 
have taken me the most of an hour to round up the 
cow and calf, for they were none too tame and my foot 
kept me from running, while I dared not trust Dan to 
assist me at the work. Finally I had horse and cows 
staked out and came back to the captain. 

“ What is it ? ” I asked excitedly, running to the foot 
of the tree where he sat in its branches. “ Have you 
seen them ? ” 

“ Climb up here, Bob,” Stimson commanded, not 
removing the glasses from his eyes. 

I obeyed, he making room for me beside him, and 
he handed me the binoculars. “ Train them on the 
top of the pass where we rounded the two peaks yes- 
terday,” he said, “ and tell me what you see.” 

I did, adjusting the focus. As the crow flies, the 
peaks were at least a dozen miles away, but the power- 
ful glass showed me five little specks that moved like 
ants on the side of the mountain. “ Are those men ?” 
I asked. 

“ Are they ? ” Stimson questioned me. 

I did not reply at once, studying their movements. 
The leading speck stopped, and four others grouped 
about it, merging into one spot of black against the 
lighter background. Then that blotch broke up into 
260 


Invaders of the Valley 

fragments which quickly became five moving specks 
again. 

“ I believe they are men,” I answered, passing the 
glass back. 

“ So do I, and I’ve studied them for an hour. They 
are men, and they are headed this way. Now, Bob, I 
intend to find out who they are and what their inten- 
tions are if I can. It may be that they are as innocent 
of evil as ourselves, foreign sailors, shipwrecked and 
fearful of us. It does not explain the shot at me, but 
that, too, may have some rational explanation. Any- 
how, I’m going to see.” 

He dropped lightly to the ground, then handed me 
the glass. “ You are to stay up there, Bobbin, and 
watch what happens. You are going to have a view 
of it all, and I believe I can trust you to do what is 
necessary in case — well, in case things go badly. Good- 
bye for a time, lad.” 

“ You will be careful, Captain I ” I pleaded as he 
grasped my hand. 

“ I have to come back to look after you, Bob,” he 
replied and ran lightly through the trees of the grove, 
his Mauser swinging at the shoulder. 

Again I found that I was not so seriously frightened 
at being left alone and in danger. I hated to see 
Stimson go, hoped he would not thrust himself into 
peril, but there was none of the fear for myself that I 
had experienced in the first days of our adventure. 
Then the thought of the possibility of being left alone 
261 


Castaway Island 

on the island would have set me quaking ; now I faced 
it with calmness, and I followed the oncoming figures 
through the glass without its trembling in my hand. 

Stimson, riding Dan at a rapid canter, came out of 
the forest on the mountainside and I, watching for him, 
picked him up in the glasses before the intruders 
caught sight of his approach. He was plainly visible 
to me, not more than a mile away, and I could see 
that he was carrying the rifle in his hand ready for use. 
The remembrance that the Mauser could slay at a dis- 
tance of a mile and that the slug which had pierced 
the tortoise shell was from an old-fashioned musket 
probably not accurate at two hundred yards, gave me 
added confidence in the captain's ability to take care 
of himself. Besides he had, in the holster at his side, 
five more leaden pellets fatal at shorter range, in the 
revolver which always snuggled there. 

From him I turned the glass on the five men above, 
now certainly men under the powerful lenses, coming 
down the mountain, following our trail of the day before. 
They had evidently not seen Stimson, and I perceived 
the reason in a spur of the hill which shut him from 
their view. At their head was the man I had seen in 
the moonlight, distinguishable by his white turban. 
Three of the men carried either muskets or sticks, 
I could not be certain which at the distance. 

Then they saw Stimson, who rode into their view 
waving a white rag at the end of his rifle. If they 
understood the truce signal they gave no indication of 
262 


Invaders of the Valley 

the fact, for they scrambled hurriedly into safe shelter 
behind boulders, disappearing completely from view. 
The captain rode forward at the same even pace, and I 
'began to fidget for fear he was getting too close, but 
there was greater distance between them than seemed 
to me, for no shot came from the hill above him. 
Finally he dismounted, and I saw him bend down to 
fix the hobbles on Dan’s legs ; then he walked ahead 
alone. 

He took the flag from the gun and waved it in his 
hand held high above his head, and I guessed he was 
shouting to them that he meant no harm and wished 
to hold converse. The answer was a puff of smoke 
from beside a rock. Stimson’s arm still held aloft the 
cloth and he went forward again, determinedly. An- 
other smoke wreath from another place and he stopped. 
He was either within range or too close for safety, but 
he waved the flag and shouted. 

Perhaps they thought he had no ammunition for his 
rifle, or that he would not use it, for one man ran from 
behind a boulder toward him and, stopping suddenly, 
raised his gun and aimed. Then Stimson’s Mauser 
spurted, and I saw the man throw high his hands, the 
musket dropping, and he fell on his face. Two smoke 
puffs from behind rocks indicated where other guns 
were handled by concealed men. 

The captain, gathering in both musket and ammuni- 
tion from him whom he had shot, ran back to Dan, 
mounted quickly and began a circuit of the hiding 
263 


Castaway Island 

places of the intruders. I could guess that he was at- 
tempting to dislodge them, to force them to uncover, 
perhaps give him opportunity for another shot, but 
they were too wily. They had evidence of his marks- 
manship, and there was safety behind the rocks. He 
did not fire again nor did they, and at last he urged 
Dan into a gallop and came back as he had gone. I 
watched the mountainside where the men lay concealed, 
for I knew that Stimson would expect it of me, would 
ask for information of what they did after his depar- 
ture, and for a long time I saw nothing of movement. 
Then the turbaned man came from his retreat, called 
to the others, and went to where the dead man lay. 
Here he was joined by three more men and for a minute 
or two they grouped there, to start again up the hill. 
Another halt and consultation which lasted longer. 
One broke from the others to go onward, three turning 
down the mountain toward our farm. The lone man 
joined them and four came into the forest beyond the 
grove just as Stimson rode up to the sentinel tree. 


264 



CHAPTER XXI 
BESIEGED 

MURDEROUS lot I ” declared Stimson when I 



had given my information. “ They are ruthless 
as wild animals, and more dangerous. We cannot be 
safe here until they are off the island or dead.” 

“ Who are they ? ” I asked. 

“ The man I killed was a peon of Ecuador, the lowest 
kind of laborer, and a convicted felon. He had been 
branded.” 

“ The man in the turban ? ” 

“ Indian of the east. The others I could not say.” 

“ Are they pirates ? ” I asked. 

Stimson smiled. “ Not as you understand the word, 
Bob. They do not sail the main in a rakish craft and 
force their captives to walk the plank. Those romantic 
brutes are of the long dead past. The man I shot was 
not a sailor.” 


265 


Castaway Island 

“ Then how comes he on the island ? ” 

“ How came they all to the island ? That is the 
question, Bob. We can make a number of guesses, 
that a ship has been wrecked on the south coast, that 
there is another island near ours to the east or south, 
that there is a village at the farther end where we have 
not been. Had we circumnavigated the island we 
would know.” 

“ They stole our raft.” 

“ They did, Bobbin lad, and they stole more. They 
stole what we did not know we owned. Look at that ! ” 
and Stimson handed me a pellet as big as a bullet 
which glistened in the sun like a rainbow although it 
was black as coal. 

“ What is it ? ” I asked. 

“ A black pearl from one of our shells left on the 
raft. That peon had found it and had it hidden in his 
belt. I took the belt to get his powder-flask and bullet 
pouch, and I found this. It is a little fortune, Bob, up 
in the States.” 

“ More valuable than a white pearl ? ” 

“ Yes, less beautiful but rarer and more valuable. 
Here, it isn’t worth a thought now, when thoughts 
may save our lives.” 

“ You feel certain these men are not pearl fishers? ” 

“We saw nothing in Ostrich Bay yesterday. If 
these men were fishers they would have a boat, a 
schooner or sloop, and it would be at anchor there. I 
gave up that idea when we passed the bay.” 

266 


“ What are we going to do, Captain ? ” 

“ That’s all questions rolled into one, Bob, and it 
must be answered in the next half hour. Four mur- 
derous men armed with at least two rifles are within a 
half hour of the grove. Shall we wait for them, go to 
them or go from them ? ” 

“ That musket would be better weapon for me than 
the shotgun,” I cried eagerly. “ Let’s meet them.” 

“ If we could meet them, Fd agree, but they will 
skulk, ambush, and murder, not fight. If I were 
certain that these four are all there are on the island, I 
would hunt them down like wild beasts, but there may 
be a colony of them at the other end. Our best move 
is to take Dan and travel southward.” 

“Abandon the farm? No, no, Captain! Don’t!” 
In the excitement of my anxiety I leaped to the 
ground, forgetting the wound in my heel, and when I 
tried to rise the foot gave way under me. Stimson 
helped me up. 

“ That answers all questions,” he said grimly, placing 
me on Dan’s back. “ We defend the hut the best we 
may until your hoof recovers.” 

“ I am sorry,” I said, but I was glad of the decision. 
I could not bear to think of the pirates, for such they 
were to me, occupying our cabin, despoiling our poultry 
yard, killing our cows. I could not believe them so 
dangerous with their old-fashioned muskets and cow- 
ardly ways. 

At the hut, Stimson looked first to my wound, which 

267 


Castaway Island 

had reopened and was bleeding again. As he poulticed 
it with balsam of Peru, the gummy sap of a tree found 
in our grove, he expressed his satisfaction at the way it 
was healing. The infection was gone ; there was no 
more poison, and with care it would quickly mend. 

Beside our hut was a spring, and Stimson had 
always intended to pipe its water inside for the con- 
venience of it, but it was one of the luxuries that had 
waited upon the necessities. There was a group of 
trees in a brush thicket around the spring, then no 
more trees until one reached the grove, a matter of a 
hundred yards. There was, however, considerable 
brush between, high enough to afford concealment for 
men, as might also the tall grass which had grown 
faster than our cattle could graze. As the captain 
pointed out, the marauders might creep up to our hut 
without our seeing them, no matter how keenly we 
watched. 

“ We must clean away,” he said, “ so we have a view 
in every direction as we now have in front and along 
the beach. The hut is like tinder, Bob, and they could 
burn it over our heads to-night.” 

“ Can't we burn off the pasture ? ” I suggested. 

“ We will try. A month later and it would be easy, 
but the grass is still green from the rains. Fortunately 
the wind is right and let's hope that there is dead-wood 
enough in the brush to carry the fire.” 

“ Will you burn the spring thicket? ” I asked. 

“ No, for it would destroy our water supply. With 
268 


the brush gone, the spring would dry up. We’ll have 
to guard the spring as well as the hut, Bob.” 

Stimson was tearing the sod away from about the 
house, clearing a space three yards wide of grass and 
combustibles, and he was soon ready to start the fire 
that was to remove all hiding places. Before doing so, 
he took several pieces of sail-cloth to the lake and 
returned with them soaking wet. Then he placed a 
match to dry grass he had raked together at the edge 
of his clearing. 

The fire spread slowly at first, but gathered impetus 
as the wind caught the flames and soon a cloud of 
smoke was rising high above a crackle of burning pas- 
ture-land. The fire ran to the south and west, for the 
wind was in the northeast, and shortly Stimson was 
beating it out at the western barrier that it might not 
run clear to Bamboo Swamp. Because it did not burn 
with the fierceness of dry grass, he was able to control 
and check it, and except for smouldering clumps of 
brush it was all out at supper time and we had a com- 
plete circle of clearing about our cabin and spring, 
three hundred feet or more that we could control with 
our rifles. 

“ To-night,” said Stimson, as we ate our evening 
meal, “ while you keep guard, I am going to bring up 
a raft of bamboos, and to-morrow we build water pipes 
and bullet-proof our fort. If we are in for a siege, let’s 
prepare for it.” 

“ I wish I could go with you, Captain,” I said wistfully. 

269 


Castaway Island 

“ No, for two reasons, Bob. Some one has to keep 
them from the cabin, and it happens there are but two 
of us ; and your foot wouldn't let you if I would. You 
have the more dangerous job of guarding the fort while 
I make a sortie. Keep inside and watch from the 
windows and door. Should they attack, aim true and 
fire quickly. There are five cartridges in the clip in 
the magazine and an extra clip at hand. You know 
how to load, you know how to aim. The rest is but to 
keep cool and not get excited. Remember that with 
the first shot fired I am on my way as fast as I can 
come, ready to help." 

“ I'll try not to be a coward," I said, and I had more 
confidence of doing the captain credit than I had ever 
felt before. 

He left after dark, for he did not want to be spied 
upon, and he went on foot. Dan was tied in the 
thicket by the spring ; the cow and her calf were still 
in the grove and I feared much would be discovered 
by the invaders. There, too, were our poultry and the 
main source of provision supply, the fruit trees. If the 
enemy was in possession of the grove, and we felt cer- 
tain they were now there, we were shut off from our 
food center. 

This was not an immediate difficulty, as there was 
sufficient of plantains, breadfruit, bananas and cocoa- 
nuts in the hut for several days, and the lake was well, 
stocked with fish. It was a worry of the future, not 
for to-night, and Stimson's theory of taking up only 
270 


Besieged 

the worries of the present made me drive the thought 
from my mind. My worry was to see that no one of 
the four men came out of the grove, and I bent every 
faculty to that task. 

A band of hapales amid the trees broke into wake- 
fulness with scoldings and chatterings that aroused the 
birds to noisy clamor, and I knew our enemies were 
active there. It was several minutes before things 
quieted down, then in the silence I heard the crash of 
something falling. That was Stimson felling bam- 
boos at the swamp, I decided, and I wondered if the 
men in the grove could hear. Something moved at 
the edge of the grove, a matter of sound, not sight. It 
was at the place closest to the hut. I cocked the rifle, 
laid it over the window ledge, and tried to make the 
binoculars pierce the blackness. 

There was something in the trees close to the stable, 
but what it was neither eyes nor glasses could discover. 

I saw a movement in the shadows and I trained the 
sights of the rifle upon it, but did not fire. It was too 
indistinct for certainty, and Stimson had told me many 
times never to send a bullet at anything whose identity 
was in question. That was why men were killed for 
deer, he said, and so the life of our cow was saved that 
night, for a minute later she broke through the fringe 
of brush into the open land, followed by her calf. 
Somehow they had escaped from their tethers in the' 
grove. 

I felt happiness and relief as I made the circuit of 
271 


Castaway Island 

the other windows and door, looking long up the lake 
where I hoped to see the black moving shape of the 
captain’s raft of bamboo. It was not in sight, nor was 
there other movement of a suspicious nature. All was 
as calm under the big, bright stars as though danger 
was unknown on Lake Plentiful. 

Again the little monkeys raised warning in the grove, 
and I hastened to the west window, trying to find the 
cause. They were watchful sentinels, and I only wished 
I could interpret their excited chatterings. Now they 
were close to the stable which I had watched before 
with beating heart, and I gave a hasty glance around 
to see that the cow had not returned there. No, she 
and the calf were grazing beyond the burned area. 
They had not raised this disturbance of the tree 
dwellers. 

A light flamed up there, sank, rose again ; then 
began a crackling of swift burning brush. The stable 
was ablaze. Dry as tinder, its thatch of long leaves a 
ready laid bonfire, it went into flames and smoke like 
an explosion. It lit up the grove, the burned area 
between us, and it was reflected in the lake, an enor- 
mous torch. The bamboo frame began to burn with 
explosions like musket fire and I, at first, believed it 
was and dived below the window ledge, but the deto- 
nations were too rapid and numerous. It would have 
required a regiment to raise such a tattoo, so I crawled 
through the door and into the spring thicket where I 
might watch the fire without making a target of myself. 

272 


Besieged 

I had no doubt that the pillagers had set this fire, 
but their reason for it was not clear. The stable was 
in their territory, not ours, and its destruction could 
not seriously injure us and might handicap them. I 
did not believe it was wanton lawlessness ; it had a 
purpose. What purpose ? 

The grating of a raft on the beach brought me to my 
feet and Stimson came running to the hut, keeping in 
the shadows. He joined me at the spring. “ Have 
you seen any of them ? ” he asked quickly. 

“ Not even a shadow,” I answered. 

“ They must be creeping up on us. Wait here,” and 
he glided away to the hut. 

He returned quickly. “ Jiminetty ! ” he muttered. 
“ Not a sign of them ! What does it mean ? ” I could 
only shake my head. “ I was sure the fire covered an 
attack. Didn't they shoot at you ? ” 

“ No. I thought they were shooting, though, when 
the bamboo began to burn.” 

“ So did I until I saw the flames. Bob, you don't 
think they burned the stable just for fun ? ” 

“ Hardly. But I can't see any other purpose.” 

“ We'll probably find out later. Let’s get back into 
the hut, Bob.” 

From the window we watched the fire burn down 
and die out to a ruddy mass of coals against the black 
trees, and nothing happened to explain its reason. 
Then Stimson rolled into his bunk and went to sleep, 
leaving me to watch until midnight. He could sleep 
273 


Castaway Island 

any time he wished, apparently, dropping off into 
slumber almost instantly, and no matter how short the 
rest it gave him renewed strength and vigor. 

I watched the grove and at short intervals made a 
circuit of the hut, studying the night shadows in every 
direction, but there was no cause for alarm. The time 
came to wake the captain, but I let it pass, willing to 
extend my watch, for I was not sleepy. All was so 
peaceful that I felt Stimson would not mind my dis- 
obedience in this, and almost did I pass over, unseeing, 
the answer to the problem of the burned stable. 

I was at the window that overlooked the grove and 
my eyes were on its fringe of trees. The late moon in 
its last quarter had risen over the lake and gave an 
added light that made objects quite distinct except in- 
side the shadow of the wood. I was certain no one 
could creep up on us now and, because the hapales and 
birds were silent in the grove, I felt sure the intruders 
were inactive. I raised my eyes to give them rest and 
saw a light far away on the mountain. 

Instantly I aroused Stimson, pointing it out to him. 
“ They have gone ! ” I cried joyfully. “ They have run 
away ! See, their camp-fire near the pass ! ” 

“ No, Bob,” he said slowly. “ They have come. 
The rest of their band has passed the peaks. The 
stable signaled them ; that fire is their answer. There 
will be more men to fight in the morning — how many 
more we don’t know. Into your bunk, for you have a 
battle on at daybreak, Bob, or I am no prophet.” 

274 



CHAPTER XXII 

THE BATTLE OF THE HUT 

I DID sleep by bits and snatches, hearing Stimson in 
the intervals moving about outside. He was at 
work and I would rather have helped him, but he 
would not let me for my wound. I knew he was forti- 
fying the hut, preparing it for battle, and it gave me 
comforting reassurance that he had technical knowl- 
edge of military preparedness. We would be at no dis- 
advantage of position, surely, and he would try to 
offset the superior number of the enemy by increased 
efficiency in ourselves. 

He aroused me before dawn, while it was still dark. 
“ Say good-bye to Dan,” he told me. “ I am going to 
send him back to the moors.” 

“ Why, Captain ? ” I asked, for this was a sad blow 
to me. 

“ They would shoot him at once, and you wouldn't 
275 


Castaway Island 

have Dan shot, Bob. He’s much better back with his 
mates.” 

I patted the horse’s neck while he nosed me over 
gently. “ Good-bye, Dan,” I whispered in his ear. 
“ I’ll come for you again, maybe,” and the captain 
loosened the tether rope, leaving him free. For the 
first time since we had him Dan was clear of hobbles 
and halters. He started away happily enough, then 
turned and came back to us. 

“ He doesn't want to go, Captain ! ” I cried, but 
Stimson flourished the rope at him, driving him away. 

“ Giddap, Dan ! Save your hide ! Back to the 
wilds ! ” he cried, and started the stallion into a gallop. 
So he disappeared into the darkness. 

“ How about Rags? ” I asked, sadly enough. “Must 
he go back to the woods ? ” 

“ He goes into the trenches with us, Bobbin. Come 
on and bring the musket.” 

All around the hut Stimson had built a trench, with 
a barricade at its outer side, deep enough so we might, 
standing erect, rest our rifles across it to aim. The 
ditch itself was about three feet deep, but bamboo posts 
and poles with dirt, sand and sods heaped against 
them added two feet more. Before the door of the 
hut this embankment was raised higher, so we might 
crawl within the cabin without exposing ourselves ; 
and he had made a pipe line of bamboo to the spring. 
By pulling a stopper from the end of a cane we had a 
liberal supply of water in the trench. 

276 


The Battle of the Hut 

We had breakfast then, and it was a good breakfast, 
with hot food and coffee. The coffee-pot, replenished, 
was put over the fire and Stimson with the rifle and I 
with the musket climbed into the ditch. There was 
the faint light in the east which told us that dawn 
would come quickly and we were ready for its 
coming. 

“ The thing I want to do,? the captain explained to 
me, “ is to find out as quickly as possible how many 
men there are against us. We know of four. I want 
to discover what the reinforcements are, for upon that 
depend our actions. We cannot fight a score of men ; 
we might fight ten.” 

“ Suppose there are a score ? ” 

“ Then the next thing we must discover is whether 
there is one man amongst them who can understand 
us, who is human enough so that we dare surrender to 
him. If you see American or European, especially 
United States, let me know at once.” 

“ You don’t mean to surrender, Captain ? ” 

“ I only hope I may, Bob ; I hate this bloodshed. I 
am going a long way to avoid it, but not far enough to 
give them our lives. Head down, Bob ! Here comes 
the sun ! ” 

It did come like an explosion, waking to immediate 
life the grove and forest, starting the birds singing and 
the monkeys in their everlasting chatter. Then a 
musket shot put an end to the peaceful harmonies 
and discords of the woods, sending the birds away on 
277 


Castaway Island 

startled wing and the hapales scampering through the 
branches. 

“ It has begun/' Stimson said, calmly, “ and begun 
by them. Ready, Bob, and steady ! Look out for a 
rush ! " 

Bang ! Bang ! Bang ! Musket shots ; then Crack ! 

“ There's a rifle over there," said Stimson. “ Keep 
your eye open for the rifleman, Bob." 

We had seen nothing yet but smoke wreaths from 
behind trees. I had heard bullets plug into the cabin 
sides and the crash of some broken dish, but I was not 
looking back to see what was happening to the hut. 
My eyes were watching the grove for sight of the 
enemy. 

“ Let them waste all the ammunition they please," 
cautioned the captain. “ We'll hold our fire to stop the 
rush. Have you seen any one yet ? " 

“ Not a man." 

“ And they haven't learned where we are. They're 
putting bullets through the hut hoping we're inside. 
I’ll take a look from the other side." 

Lowering his head, Stimson ran around the corner 
of the trench, disappearing from view. The rifle spoke 
again, then again, and more slugs from muskets whizzed 
overhead. As before, the musket reports came almost 
together, bang ! bang ! bang ! Another pause, and a 
third rifle shot. 

Stimson returned, coming from in front ; he had 
circled the cabin. “ No shooting from the other side," 
278 


The Battle of the Hut 


he said, “ but there are men in the grove over there. 
1 saw them moving around. ” 

“ They’re at something yonder ! ” I whispered. 
“ Look ! ” 

Among the trunks of the trees a number of forms 
were moving, gathering in one place near the outer 
fringe of trees. 

“ Ready now, Bob. It’s a charge,” cried the captain, 
bringing his rifle to his shoulder just as the men broke 
with a shout from the woods. “ Let them have it, 
Bob ! Fire ! ” and I pulled trigger with muzzle aimed 
in the center of the group. Stimson’s Mauser sent 
five bullets so closely one behind the other that it 
seemed a rattle, not a series of reports. Before I had 
ramrod down barrel on the powder charge, reloading, 
Stimson handed me his rifle. “ Slip this clip in, Bob,” 
he said, cool as he ever was ; “ you may use the Mauser 
now,” and he was firing with the revolver. 

It took but a second to place the clip of five car- 
tridges in the magazine, but Stimson had dashed to 
the rear of the hut, and I heard him firing there. No- 
body was in front of me to shoot at — nobody stand- 
ing, — so I ran to join him. “ Stopped it here,” he 
said. “ Come on,” and we went around the house to 
where the fight had started. 

I do not believe that it all lasted more than a min- 
ute. Stimson had fired five shots from rifle, and five 
from revolver, and I had discharged the musket once. 
The enemy had emptied what guns they had, retiring 
279 


Castaway Island 

more quickly than they came ; or such as were able 
had retired. There were four motionless clumps of 
clothing lying in the burned stubble close to the line 
of the grove. Another man, Stimson told me, was at 
the other side of the house, badly wounded. At least 
five of our aggressors were out of the battle. 

“ There are not more than ten or twelve left, Bob,” said 
the captain, finishing the job of loading the musket, 
“and I believe they're shy of firearms. I am going 
to get the glasses and study this matter of weapons.” 

“ I heard no shot fired from the other side of the 
hut,” I suggested. 

“ They didn't fire. Eight men were running up 
when I turned the corner and began on them. They 
stopped and went back promptly and quickly. I did 
not see a single musket.” 

Crack ! A shot came from the grove, and it was not 
aimed at the hut. It splashed sand into our faces. 
“ That was a rifle,” said Stimson, “ and whoever is 
using it can shoot. Did they have more than one rifle 
among them, Bob ? ” 

“ I think not. It was easy to distinguish its sound 
from the musket reports. I should say there was but 
one rifle.” 

Crack ! Again a little shower of sand, and the 
zr-r-r-r of a deflected bullet singing through the air. 
Stimson grasped my arm and dragged me around the 
corner of the hut. “ That man is getting too precise 
with his bullets,” he said. “ I wonder how he located us.” 

280 


The Battle of the Hut 

Stimson peered out above the ramparts and ducked 
down immediately as the rifle sounded its sharp warn- 
ing. The bullet slapped into the earth where his head 
had been. “ Jiminetty ! ” gasped the captain. “ That 
man is worth the rest of them put together. I must 
find him, Bob.” 

He went to the other end of the trench, creeping 
low, and placing his cap on the end of the rifle, raised 
it carefully above the ground. Crack, slap ! and it 
rolled into the ditch. Stimson picked it up ruefully. 

“ He’s a sharpshooter, Bob. If the rest have sense 
to leave him on the job while they rush, we’re gone. 
A little judgment and nerve right now and they win.” 

Fortunately for us, either judgment or nerve was 
lacking. The sickening results of their first charge 
were still too recent a memory, and Stimson was think- 
ing fast. “ You try the cap trick, Bob,” he said, “ while 
I see if I can locate him,” and he crawled to the door 
of the hut, vanishing within. 

I raised my hat as I had seen him do and heard two 
rifles speak almost simultaneously. There was a cry 
from the grove as something crashed in the branches. 
“ I brought him down,” Stimson said, rejoining me. 
“ He was well up in a tree. Did he hit your hat ? ” 

I looked at it, finding a hole through it, and I 
handed it to the captain. “ I hope he can’t raise rifle 
to shoulder again,” Stimson muttered. “ He’s too 
clever for comfort. He’s using a heavy bore, single 
shot breech loader.” He had run a finger through 
281 


Castaway Island 

the hole in his cap, comparing its size with the hole 
in mine. 

“ Didn’t you kill him?” I asked. 

“ I shot at the center of the smoke puff. I didn’t 
see him at all, but I judge from the crash that he was 
hit. We’ll know soon how badly he was wounded.” 

For a long while there were no more shots from the 
grove, although we invited them with hats and my 
blouse rigged up to look natural and careless. We 
made narrow peek-holes between the bamboos, scrap- 
ing the sand away and forcing sods apart, but there 
was no one in sight in the grove. With frequent 
excursions about the hut and careful scrutiny of the 
grove the morning hours passed, and there was no 
further attack. The wounded man at the side of the 
cabin had crawled back to his fellows in the woods 
and we, knowing he was doing it, allowed it. None 
of the four near the grove had stirred. 

“ We’re no better off for information than this 
morning,” Stimson said after an elaborate effort with a 
dummy representation of myself had failed to draw 
their fire. “ We know they have ten to fifteen men, 
a rifle and at least three muskets. Some of the 
others are armed with machetes and some with spears, 
and they are a mixed lot of South American peons, 
enganchadores, and coolies from China and India. I 
haven’t seen a white man in the band. Who they are 
and how they got here is as much a mystery as ever.” 

“ We know they want to kill us,” I suggested, sadly. 

282 


The Battle of the Hut 


“ Yes, and they’ll do it, too, unless we use our wits. 
We can’t beat them fighting at this game. We’re 
playing into their hands, sitting here waiting for 
them. A chance shot, night, thirst, hunger, — all are 
in their favor, Bob. They can lie hidden there and 
beat us, they can rush us or sneak up on us in the 
dark and we’re done. No, we mustn’t fight their way, 
but make them fight ours.” 

“ Which is?” 

“ To outmaneuver them, pit our brains against 
theirs. We’ve been playing one trick over and over 
again. We’ll play a new trick. You rig up the 
musket at that end of the pit with a fish-line hitched 
to the trigger and I’ll get the shotgun up at this end. 
Fix yours as I do mine,” and he went to work at the 
new plan without further words. 

Watching him, I had shortly arranged the musket 
so that it might be discharged by a pull at the string 
and Stimson brought the end of his line to me. 
“ Now, Bob,” he said, “ I am going to leave you the 
Mauser and I am going off on a scouting expedition 
with the revolver. The minute you see any one break 
from the cover of the woods, let loose your battery and 
pot him with the rifle. I don’t expect you to land 
anything with the set guns, but they will add to the 
excitement. Make the Mauser do business.” 

“ How long will you be gone, Captain ? ” I asked ; I 
had learned not to ask how he was to get away. He 
always had a means to carry out his plans. 

283 


Castaway Island 

“ If I am not back before dark, don't worry. 
Should I fire twice, quickly, make a run to me re- 
gardless of anything. Get to me just as quickly as 
you can, leaving it to me to protect you. Good-bye, 
Bobbin." 

He shook my hand, then jumped from the trench 
and ran for the shore. In a second he was at the 
beach, dashing through the shallow water. There he 
gave a wild cry of defiance, echoed by musket shots 
and a howl of rage from the grove. A spattering of 
bullets against the surface of the lake marked the 
place where he had dived into deep water. 

I did not see all this, for my eyes kept jumping 
back from Stimson to the trees where the men were 
concealed. Again the captain gave a yell, this time 
more of terror, and out from behind the trees rushed 
the outlaws, shouting and shooting. I pulled the 
trigger lines, jerking out an explosion like a cannon, 
for Stimson had loaded the guns with extra powder 
and added slugs ; and I grabbed up the Mauser, wait- 
ing for the smoke to blow away. Stimson had said, 
“ Make the Mauser do business," and I did not want 
to waste his cartridges. 

As it lifted on the wind, I saw a confused group of 
men, some headed toward the lake, others running 
desperately for the trees, still others unable to run at 
all. In pointing the weapons, Stimson had guessed 
well. The buckshot had scattered widely, the distance 
being great, and three men who were down were not 
284 


The Battle of the Hut 


the only ones wounded. There were men holding their 
faces in their hands, men hopping on one foot, men 
groaning with body wounds. 

The white-turbaned Indian was running toward the 
beach, holding his musket high in air. Behind him 
were three other men, and they were all armed with 
guns. Aiming quickly at the foremost, I fired and 
missed. I had been too eager, too excited. My nerves 
were on edge, my hand shook. 

I rested the rifle across the barrier. By an effort of 
will I forced myself to be calm. I brought the rifle 
sights into bearing on the white turban, then dropped 
lower, aiming at the body. I pressed the trigger 
steadily. It was a straightaway shot at a running man 
at less than three hundred yards with a rifle that car- 
ried true, pointblank, at almost double that distance. 

Stimson would have fired a full clip, five cartridges, 
while I was aiming that shot, each as true to its mark, 
but with the bark of the rifle the Indian spun around 
as though struck by a heavy rock. His musket flew 
through the air. I thought he would fall, but he 
pulled himself up and began a zigzag run for the trees, 
stumbling and swaying. 

The three others followed him, one picking up the 
musket as he passed it, and I did not shoot again. I could 
not, they running for escape, even though I knew that 
they would be attempting my life and Stimson's as soon 
as they regained shelter ; that our only safety was in 
treating them as we would mad dogs or venomous snakes. 

285 


Castaway Island 

I knew that Stimson had safely run the gauntlet, 
although I had not seen him since his first shout to 
drag the skulkers from the wood. His trick had suc- 
ceeded, for we had not only seen the strength of our 
opponents but had materially lessened it. Of the* 
three men downed by my volley from the trench, one 
still lay where he fell, the others, wounded, having 
made back to the shelter of trees. In all twelve men 
had come out of the grove at Stimson’s call, half of 
whom were armed only with stabbing spears and 
machetes, and one was dead, three seriously wounded, 
and as many more injured. 

As though I had seen it, I knew how Stimson had 
escaped, diving and ducking, swimming under water 
as he had the day he captured the ducks. Now he 
was hidden somewhere along the shore, perhaps in 
Bamboo Swamp, and he had a revolver and plenty of 
cartridges. He was a flanking army, able to carry 
the attack to the enemy’s camp, while they were still 
questioning how many defenders there might be at 
the cabin trench. Three guns had met their charge ; 
would they guess that one boy had fired them all? 

I wondered how well we had deceived them as I 
reloaded musket and shotgun and rearranged the firing 
cords. Then I crept into the cabin and found food 
and a cup of coffee. Rags, tied to a leg of my bunk, 
greeted me joyfully, and I brought him back to keep 
me company in the trench. It promised to be a lonely 
afternoon. 


286 



CHAPTER XXIII 
BLACK PRIXCE 

S O far as I could judge in my peep-hole surveys 
about the hut that afternoon, I had the safest 
place on the island, and when a band of marmosets 
took position in the branches of the grove’s fringe 
where the outlaws had been, gamboling and chattering 
together, I knew that the enemy had retreated else- 
where. Rags received lesson number two, kinder- 
garten department, in recognizing why a stick was 
thrown by me to the other end of the trench, and 
what was his connection with the affair. 

I built up the fire at supper time, hoping that the 
captain would return for the meal, but there was no 
sign of him and Rags and I ate our poi and fruit to- 
gether. When sunset came I began to worry ; I was 
not so sure that Stimson had escaped that fusillade on 
the lake, that his second cry was a decoy, not of real 
287 


Castaway Island 

dismay. Night shadows were beginning to have a 
sinister aspect, the friendly monkeys had stopped their 
calls, the birds were at rest. Rags, filled with food, 
went to sleep in his old place in my blouse, leaving me 
to my thoughts and worriments. 

Stimson's philosophy of life excluded worrying. 
Many a time he had told me that three-fourths of the 
ills of life were merely regrets over what was past and 
anxiety over the future, neither of which might be 
bettered by worrying. I knew that I was gaining 
nothing sitting there in the gathering darkness giving 
my fears free rein to picture catastrophes that only 
might have happened. Stimson had not been wounded, 
for the turbaned bandit would never have headed a 
chase along the shore to kill him if the captain was 
not making good his escape. Stimson had told me 
distinctly not to worry if he was still away at dark ; 
he would be carrying out his mission, protecting us 
from the enemy. Still, knowing all this, I worried, 
nor could I get my mind away from its thoughts of 
trouble. 

The night settled down dark and starless, for a high 
fog had drifted in and it was useless attempting sur- 
veys through the peek-holes or even over the barriers. 
I could see no farther than the end of my rifle. If 
any one wanted to creep up on me, he would meet no 
opposition except the impalpable blackness. To my 
ears alone was left the cabin's protection, and I listened 
with an acuteness which made the crackle of a twig 
288 


Black Prince 


seem a rifle shot. And, listening, I heard the tramp 
of the approaching galapagos, as I had heard them 
before, the sound coming to me through the earth and 
approaching from the end of the lake by the bamboo 
swamp. 

I knew at once what the sound was, but it gave me 
the same impression of marching men that I once be- 
lieved it, the steady, heavy tread of a large band of 
men, keeping perfect time. It came nearer, and I was 
glad of the darkness that I might not again see the 
grotesque forms, the snake-like, craning heads and 
necks, the ugly deformities that served for legs. They 
would pass near the cabin, judging from the sound, 
between it and the grove. 

They were close enough so that their footsteps were 
individually distinguishable when I noticed another 
sound I had not heard before, the clatter of metal as 
though [of swords or rifles striking buckles. In the 
instant my whole idea was changed ; these were march- 
ing soldiers, not the mastodon tortoises. My hands 
clutched the rifle and my eyes tried to pierce the 
veiling blackness, tried vainly until they ached and 
throbbed. Out there, marching past the hut, were 
trained men at arms ; were they friends or enemies ? 

A firm, strong voice gave an order. It was in Span- 
ish, but there was the unmistakable commanding tone 
of the military leader. A minute later, a crashing in 
the brush told me that the force had entered the grove, 
and a series of commands rang out, following one on 
289 


Castaway Island 

the other, as the footsteps died away in the distance. 
Whoever they were, allies or foes, they had disappeared 
in the forest. 

“Bob?” It was Stimson's voice close beside me, 
and I answered it with a glad cry as he sprang into 
the trench and caught me in his arms. “All safe 
enough now, Bobbie lad,” he said, hugging me against 
him so hard that Bags whined a protest. “ There 
will be no more fighting to-night and no worry over 
our enemies. If they're not through the pass right 
now, it is only because they can't run fast enough, and 
they're on their way. Did you hear my army go by ? ” 

“ It was you ? ” I cried. 

“ I was in command. There were some fifty or more 
in the company.” 

“ And they — who were they ? ” 

“ What ! Didn't you recognize your old friends, the 
galapagos ? ” 

“ I did, then didn't. I knew them when they came, 
then heard the noise of guns and orders given.” 

“ I was both guns and orders. I did the clatter and 
gave the commands ; also, I turned the turtles into the 
grove and headed them to where our intrusive neigh- 
bors were camped. They left before we arrived — left 
hurriedly, Bob, because they never heard galapagos 
marching before. I wonder where they thought we 
found our army.” 

I laughed long and loudly, more in relief of all my 
fears than at the humor of attacking with a band of 
290 


Black Prince 


turtles. Stimson had tried a new trick and it had suc- 
ceeded. For the present, at least, we were relieved of 
anxiety and the dread of a night surprise. We could 
eat and sleep guarded by imaginary sentinels of the 
tortoise brigade. 

I know that my eyes never opened once during the 
night and that I slept as soundly and dreamed as 
peacefully as any time in all my life. I awakened 
only at the captain’s call that breakfast was ready, and 
found that Rags had deserted me for a cocoanut bowl 
of meat and poi. The sun was high overhead, the 
grove filled with bird calls and the lake a blue mirror 
of cloudless skies. The nightmare had passed. 

Stimson left for the grove directly after breakfast. 
“ I must make certain that they have all gone,” he 
said. “ Keep a good watch, Bob, and remember my 
signal, two shots as quickly as I can pull trigger. You 
know what it means.” 

“ I am to get to you as rapidly as I can travel,” I 
answered. 

“ Correct. I’ll leave you the rifle,” and he made his 
way to where the huddled forms still lay on the 
ground. I guessed what he intended to do, and 
shouted to him that I would help, but he waved me 
back. “ Leave it to me,” he cried. “ Stay there and 
nurse your foot.” 

I knew he was purposely keeping me from the disa- 
greeable labor of the burial, so took Rags out in front 
of the house where I could not see him and for the 
291 


Castaway Island 

first time secured results from my training of the 
puppy. Rags brought back my thrown stick. He 
would not give it to me, seeming to think he had 
earned it and it needed worrying and growling over, 
but he had learned to retrieve it. I forced it from 
him and made him repeat the trick a number of 
times. 

It was a lazy morning for me. Once in a while I 
would make a circuit of the cabin, carefully surveying 
the landscape, but there was no indication of danger. 
The cow and calf grazed at the edge of the burned 
space and once I saw Dan, or another horse, far down 
the lake toward Roaring River. I felt sure it must be 
Dan, and I was happy to think he had remained on 
our side of the mountains. 

Stimson returned in the early afternoon, and reported 
that there were no living men in the grove. He had 
gone as far as the timber grew to the southward and 
had seen nothing suspicious. “ They scampered off 
clear beyond the peaks,” he said, “and I doubt if they 
have the courage to return.” 

“But the wounded?” I asked. “Could they go 
such a distance? ” 

“ There are no wounded left,” he answered. “ They 
have gone.” 

“ The turbaned man I hit — he would not be able to 
walk far,” I insisted, for I felt certain that Stimson 
was concealing something. 

“ Bob,” said Stimson, solemnly, “ I have told you 
292 


Black Prince 


there are no living men out yonder. I am quite sure 
of that. Leave it alone,” and I did not question more. 
If I had taken human life, I was not to know it. 

I told him I had seen Dan, and after dinner we 
walked down the lake in search of him, I limping 
along on my crutch, but we went home disappointed. 
We found his tracks, or those I was certain were his, 
but he had made off down the creek toward Roaring 
River. Next morning Stimson set out alone and rode 
him back before noon. Dan had entered the trap we 
made for wild horses, eaten the old hay on the trigger 
and sprung shut the falling gate. He was feeding 
quite contentedly when Stimson arrived, and seemed 
glad to be retaken. 

A week passed by without other incident of impor- 
tance. Each morning the captain made a scouting ex- 
cursion on Dan's back and returned with the word 
that we were alone in our valley. Each day my foot 
improved under the healing qualities of the balsam 
until I finally threw away the crutch, and we hunted 
in the woods, fished in the lake, attended our cows and 
poultry, taught Rags new tricks, studied the birds and 
monkeys in the grove, [and lived quite the old life 
again ; but there was a difference. It was the knowl- 
edge of danger, the fear of sudden attack, the dread 
of a separation, and this difference spoiled the pleasure 
and happiness of our farm on Lake Plentiful. 

When Stimson was away, I waited his return in fear 
and anxiety ; each excursion with him was spoiled by 

293 


Castaway Island 

the necessity of caution and ceaseless watch ; the 
nights were rounds of sentry duty. We dared not 
swim together in the lake, but one must stay on the 
shore, rifle in hand, and watch. Any disturbance of 
the birds or the cessation of the monkeys’ chatter 
would send us scurrying for the trench. I tried to 
keep my feelings to myself for I did not wish Stimson 
to know I was unhappy or that my cowardice was 
clouding the sunshine of these summer days for me ; 
was changing our orchard into a lurking place and 
ambush for assassins, making our home a fortified 
trench. I tried to keep the captain from seeing that I 
was afraid each minute he was away that he might 
never return and that my sleep was broken with the 
expectation of musket shots from the night. 

It was a Sunday evening and we had returned from 
a quiet walk up the lake shore to the edge of Bam- 
boo Swamp and back through the grove. Although 
nothing had been said by either of us, I knew it was a 
scouting expedition disguised as a Sabbath stroll. It 
had been our custom always on the afternoon of Sunday, 
and to me one of the great pleasures of the week, for 
bird or beast was that day safe from our guns and the 
fish had sanctuary in lake and stream. 

As we entered the door of the cabin, putting the 
guns we had carried in their new places within reach 
of our hands, Stimson placed an arm over my 
shoulder, drawing me close to his side. “ We can’t go 
on this way, Bobbin, lad,” he said gently. “ Sit here 
294 


Black Prince 

beside me and let’s talk it all out. You are not happy ; 
I can see that. It is the anxiety, is it not ? ” 

“ Yes, Captain, I am scared. I am like the pheasant 
I wounded — you remember ? Back on the moors ? It 
hid from our search in the grass, but it must have kept 
peeking out, frightened and lamed, expecting me to 
shoot again each minute, till it died.” 

The captain shook his head gravely. “ Get that 
thought out of your mind, Bob, and quickly. You 
shot the pheasant in the necessity for food and we 
made search for it carefully. Whether it died from 
the wound or, as is more likely, recovered and flew 
away, no blame rests on you and such thoughts as you 
harbor are unhealthy. A regret cherished unduly is a 
wrong to yourself. Forget it.” 

“ I think it is because I feel we are in the same situ- 
ation that I remember,” I explained. 

“Yes, you are making yourself ill, Bob, over the 
anxieties of to-morrow. It is true something may 
happen to-morrow, but so long as we have done to-day 
all possible to prevent to-morrow’s ill, let’s not worry 
about it. I am not going to talk with you of yester- 
day’s regrets or of to-morrow’s anxieties, but of to- 
day’s necessities. Your wound has healed, Bob? ” 

“ Yes,” I answered, wondering at this sudden change 
in the conversation. 

“ Do you see that peak off there ? ” Stimson pointed 
through the window to the highest point on the island, 
a mountain to the southeast that reached more than 
295 


Castaway Island 

a half mile into the skies. “ We’re going to climb 
to the top of it, Bob, and find out the why and 
wherefore of our intruders. From there we should 
see over the whole southern half of the island, and its 
east coast will be at our feet. I have waited for you to 
get strong enough to make the journey.” 

“ I am ready now, Captain.” 

“ Then we start to-night. There will be a new moon 
to help us on the way. Come along ; we’ll get ready ; ” 
and we began selection of what to take and leave. 

It was nine o’clock and a slim, crescent moon was 
midway to the zenith when we closed the door of our 
cabin and led Dan, with a neatly balanced pack, and 
with Rags in one pannier, down the shore of the lake. 
I turned more than once to look back at our little hut 
with the stone chimney against its side, the long leaves 
of nipa straggling over the eaves. I do not believe I 
could have borne to leave it had I known that it was 
for the last time, for it had been the home of happiness 
as well as battle and bloodshed. 

We turned south and began the climb at Roaring 
River. We were traveling light, carrying nothing but 
the rifle and Stimson’s revolver, the other guns and all 
the ammunition remaining being a part of Dan’s pack. 
Even then it was slow going, for the ascent was steep 
and detours necessary to get Dan up. We passed the 
place where we had shot the dogs and just before dawn 
made camp in a little nook close beside the tumbling 
waters of the river. Dan was picketed, after the pack 
296 


Black Prince 

had been removed, and there was good grazing for 
him. 

We stayed there that day, not venturing from the 
dell, and it was after nightfall when we resumed the 
journey. Each hour the climbing became more diffi- 
cult and the river smaller, and it was still dark when 
we came to the spring which was its beginning. We 
were high up in the mountain but still far from its 
summit, as Stimson assured me. 

Supper — for we were turning the day around and 
night was our day — was made as before without a fire 
and we rolled into our blankets and close together, for 
the heights were not equatorial, especially at night. 
Stimson was off into slumber almost as soon as he laid 
head to earth, but I couldn't sleep. Trying to by 
counting imaginary sheep coming from a corral I 
heard Dan whinny softly. 

It was the same pleased little neigh with which he 
greeted Stimson when he came to him mornings, or 
me if I brought him food. It was a greeting, and in- 
stantly I left dream sheep to wonder what had caused 
Dan to begin talking. He was picketed some distance 
from our sleeping place, but I could hear him moving 
about and again he neighed. 

I awoke Stimson, which was obeying orders. Any- 
thing unusual, no matter how trivial, was reason 
enough to arouse him. His quick, quiet, “ What is it, 
Bob ? ” was answered by a whispered explanation. 

Stimson lay silent waiting. Dan whinnied softly 
297 


Castaway Island 

and we heard the thud of hoofs on earth at a trot. 
Stimson leaped to his feet, starting forward into the 
dark, then stopped. He had heard Dan neigh again, 
and Dan was where he should have been, at the end of 
a tether rope. 

“ He’s having callers,” whispered the captain, sitting 
beside me. “ Creep to the pack, Bob, and get my hide 
lariat — quiet as a mouse ! If the visitors stay for 
breakfast I’ll get one to remain for keeps.” 

I noiselessly brought him the rope and, cautioning 
me to wait, he glided toward Dan, disappearing imme- 
diately from my sight. I did wait for seeming hours, 
hearing the murmurs of the horses, the beat of their 
hoofs but no sound of Stimson. Then the sun came 
up, almost startling me, so quickly did it change night 
into day, and instantly there was commotion. There 
were loud snorts and neighing protests, a small thun- 
der of hoofs, and Stimson’s call to me to bring the 
hobbles. Anticipating the sun, the captain had been 
ready to hurl noose over the neck of one of Dan’s early 
callers, and when I arrived at the scene of action he was 
on Dan’s back making our horse help him in the sub- 
jugation of the black stallion. 


298 



CHAPTER XXIV 

THE BATTLE IX THE GULCH 

u T AM wondering whether Black Prince is worth 
what he cost,” said Stimson late that afternoon, 
referring to our latest addition to the family, now 
staked out beside Dan and quietly feeding. 

“ What was the cost ? ” I asked, wonderingly, for I 
knew Stimson did not refer to the work of many hours 
in breaking Black Prince to ride. 

“ I can’t tell yet. For his sake I took the chance of 
discovery of our expedition by the outlaws. That 
chance was the price we pay for our horse. They may 
have seen me cavorting about the hillside on him, 
maybe not ; but we must move cautiously to-night, 
Bob. We shouldn’t be taking chances.” 

I thought Black Prince was worth greater risk than 
seemed probable had been taken, but I did not say so, 
299 


Castaway Island 



HUGH LIBOBGES’ MAP OF THE GALAPAGOS ISLANDS 

(See page 6 ) 

300 


The Battle in the Gulch 


for the captain spoke earnestly and was studying the 
landscape with the glass in an anxious carefulness. 
We had slept not at all during the day, and now he 
prepared to move forward without waiting for night. 
Water bags were filled at the spring, Dan was packed, 
and after eating a hearty meal of cold provisions and 
the last of our fresh fruit, we started the final stage of 
the climb to the mountain top, Rags chasing happily 
beside us. Stimson had promised we should see the 
sunrise from the summit, and even with Black Prince’s 
many obstinacies and refusals to accept the captain’s 
guidance, we came out upon the hog-back that marked 
the last half mile of rise just as the sun, for the first 
time in our personal knowledge and view since we 
came to the island, rose up out of the sea. 

We stopped at once and gazed across the ocean east- 
ward. Near by, a little to the south, not a score 
of miles away, lay another island even larger, I 
thought, than the one we were on ; certainly its moun- 
tains were taller, for clouds hung about the peaks of 
the loftiest. The captain with the glass found other 
islands farther away, two at least, perhaps a third, 
though it might be a cloud bank or fog. 

“ We have at last begun to learn something of our 
surroundings,” he said, handing me the binoculars. 
“ We are not so isolated as I feared, and it will be easy 
for us to make that nearest island.” 

I studied it with the glasses. “ There is smoke ris- 
ing from it — see ? ” and I pointed to where a thin wisp 
301 


Castaway Island 

of straw-colored fames rose above the mountains. 
Stimson eagerly adjusted the glasses I handed him. 

“ A volcano, Bob,” he said finally. “ No, there is 
no sign of human life visible there. But come along, 
lad, and we’ll get a view of our own unknown land. 
We can see to the south from the peak.” 

We hastened on to the summit and, turning its rock- 
piled crest, had the whole southern part of the island 
at our feet. Here the mountain fell away almost pre- 
cipitously for a thousand feet and the coast line stretched 
from east to west, the half circle of our vision. To 
the direct east, the mountains ran down to the sea, but 
farther south sloped gradually to sand-dunes, shining 
like silver in the morning sun. There was a bay at 
our southeastern corner, with two little islets of sand 
at its point, and almost against the bay was a great 
lagoon, many miles long. “ That is our river,” ex- 
plained Stimson, pointing it out. “ It has been 
dammed by the sand and makes that big lake.” 

“ But wouldn’t the river carry out the sand and 
clear its course ? ” I asked. 

“ The waves of the ocean now are stronger than the 
river’s current, but there is a perpetual battle between 
them. In the rainy season the river wins, for its 
swollen waters clear the ocean sands away and it runs 
free. Then there is no lake there, just a narrow river 
bottom. Now the sea is the victor.” 

“It was in the lagoon you found the mussels?” I 
asked, and Stimson nodded. He was looking over the 
302 


The Battle in the Gulch 


moor we had once crossed so painfully to find the 
river, studying it with his glasses. 

“ They are not there/’ he said. 

“ The pirates? ” 

He laughed. “ If you want to call them that. I 
hoped to find them somewhere out there between Os- 
trich Bay and Point Pillar, but they’re not along 
South River.” 

“ How can you be sure ? ” I asked, for there were 
many hiding places for more men than were of our 
enemies. 

“ See ? Yonder is a herd of cattle feeding. Nearer 
the river, a band of horses. You remember how they 
disappeared before our approach, Bob ? ” 

“ We saw only their dust,” I answered. 

“ They would not be quiet with a body of men on 
the moors. Your pirates are not along South River, 
Bobbin.” 

“ Then where? ” 

“ I’m afraid they’re behind us.” 

“ On Roaring River? ” 

“ At Lake Plentiful.” I turned to him quickly with 
a cry of dismay. “ I was afraid of it, Bobbin,” Stim- 
son continued, “ and that’s the real reason we are not 
in our cabin at Lake Plentiful now. We could not ex- 
pect our trick to be permanent in its fright. These 
are men, and they would ask themselves why the 
soldiery, for that is what they believed the galapagos 
to be, did not follow up the attack, trail them down. 

303 


Castaway Island 

Then they would take measures to find out. Spies 
have reported that we were alone at the hut. It may 
be known that we have come here, and it is possible 
that we were followed.” 

“Then we are not going back, Captain ? ” Tasked 
the question sadly. Even with its trenches and burned 
pasture, it was still home to me. 

“ We will make our home where they are not,” he 
answered, cheerfully enough. “ Between the lagoon, 
the river and Ostrich Bay is territory enough for us to 
wander on our horses, and it holds game, fish, oysters 
and mussels — sufficient food. Besides, pearls.” He 
added the last word with a laugh. 

As we could K not camp there on the summit for its 
rocky bleakness, we retraced our way back to the timber 
line and found pasturage for the horses ; then I made 
up for lost sleep. Stimson had said nothing to me of 
keeping watch, and as we had not done so any previous 
time on the journey, it never entered my head that we 
should take turn about. He dozed and watched, alter- 
nately, during the day. 

We left at dark, headed westward over the mountain 
ridge that separated us from South River canyon, and 
after some hard traveling reached a gradually sloping 
hillside resembling the moors beyond the river. Here 
our progress was rapid, for we could ride the horses. 
Dan’s load had been so much reduced through our 
healthy appetites that my added weight upon his back 
was no discomfort, and Stimson, with Rags in his shirt, 

304 


The Battle in the Gulch 


rode Black Prince. It was midnight when we splashed 
through the stream and went into camp on its western 
side. 

The next morning we made up the river, passing 
the place where we had camped before when I found 
Rags, going over familiar ground most of the way. 
Stimson was hunting for a valley beside the stream, a 
widening of its narrow canyon that he had noted before, 
an ideal place for our new home, concealed amid crags 
but covered with good pasturage and sufficient shade. 

We came to it finally, entering it from below, climb- 
ing up the river bottom, and as though to signal our 
arrival, a musket shot rang out, sending the horses into 
wild dancing and my heart into my throat. “ Dis- 
mount ! ” cried Stimson, the order ringing out sharp as 
though to a troop of cavalry. I leaped from Dan, 
hanging by the bridle reins, and I ran to where Stim- 
son was sitting the plunging Black Prince, the rifle at 
a ready, and his keen eyes searching the glade. 

“ Get down — please, Captain,” I pleaded, and he 
leaped to my side. 

“ Go back with the horses,” he commanded, handing 
me Black Prince's rope. “ Tether them in the thicket 
below, then creep back to me.” 

I made as rapid time as I could, but the black was 
frightened and stubborn. Twice I heard Stimson's 
rifle crack and a number of scattered shots in answer. 
I was sure that we had run directly into the bandits' 
lair ; that the captain had guessed wrong. 

305 


Castaway Island 

He was behind a rock aiming at something up the 
valley I could not see when I crept up. He fired, then 
lowered the rifle to greet me with a smile. “ Horses 
all right ? ” he asked. 

“ Scared, but safely tied,” I answered. “ Have we 
run into their camp ? ” 

“ No ; they were on their way to meet us, but didn’t 
expect us to move so rapidly. We have given them 
the surprise they expected to give us. But there are 
more men now, Bob.” 

“ More ? ” 

“ They have reinforcements again. Where they 
spring from I can’t guess, but ” 

Crack ! A rifle spoke from the hill at our side, and 
Stimson dropped his Mauser and grabbed at his shoul- 
der. “ Jiminetty ! that is our old friend again,” he 
grunted, pressing me around a corner of rock out of 
range. “ That rifle sounds and shoots familiar.” 

“ You are hit ? ” 

“ Shoulder here. Rip off my shirt and strip it into 
bandages, quickly, Bob ! Cut it away with your knife 
— but keep down ! — keep down ! That man can shoot ! ” 

I had a pad over the wound and a bandage holding 
it tight in a few minutes, but twice we shifted positions 
to dodge the marksman. “ We must get back to the 
horses,” said Stimson, handing me the rifle and pulling 
his revolver from its holster. “ I can use this with my 
left hand, but I am no one-handed rifle shot. Bob, 
see if you can clear that sharpshooter from our way.” 

306 


The Battle in the Gulch 

Another bullet spit in, nearly wrenching the gun 
from my hands, for it had clipped the butt, ricocheting 
with an angry buzz. We shifted hastily, but I had 
seen the smoke of the discharge. The man was behind 
a tree on the side hill overlooking the canyon. I 
watched that tree, the rifle ready to fire. 

“ Praise be, — the shadows are lengthening ! ” ex- 
claimed Stimson, earnestly. “ Night will be down on 
us in an hour if we can hold out.” 

I made no reply, for I had my eyes on the tree where 
I knew the marksman was concealed, nor did I shift 
them when Stimson’s revolver began to talk. The man 
saw his opportunity in the new attack to secure posi- 
tion and he glided from concealment. I was ready, 
gun at my shoulder, and I fired the moment he came 
into view. With the crack of my rifle he tumbled and, 
rocks and dirt giving way, he crashed through the 
brush down the steep slope. Almost to our rock he 
rolled with the impetus of his fall and he lay all 
crumpled up on the ground before me. A wild howl 
came from the other side of the canyon, shots were 
fired and Stimson’s pistol answered sharply. 

“ It sounded as though you landed, Bob,” called 
Stimson through the powder fumes. “ All well with 
you ? ” 

“ Yes, Captain. He fell into the gulch, and he’s 
American ! ” 

“U. S., is he? I thought he might be from his 
shooting. Wait — I’m coming,” and he crawled to my 
307 


Castaway Island 

side. From behind the rock he peered out at the 
fallen man. 

The figure moved, first an arm, then raised his head 
slowly and painfully and looked back at Stimson. I 
was watching, and I saw an almost grotesque look of 
amazement come into the swarthy face. 

“ Merton ? ” cried Stimson, sharply. The man brought 
up his hand to salute, then fell back with a groan. 

“ Help me, Bob,” and Stimson was at the fallen 
man’s side. Together we brought him back behind 
our rocky barrier and the captain was holding the 
water bag to his lips. There was a blotch of red on 
the shirt over his right breast. “ One of my men, 
Bob, — of the Tatterdemalions,” explained Stimson, 
bandaging the wound. “ He killed a tentmate in a 
drunken row, was sentenced as a convict. How came 
he here? ” 

“ Will he ever be able to tell us ? ” I asked, anxiously. 

“ The wound is not necessarily fatal. If we can get 
him out of here we may save his life.” 

Again Merton opened his eyes in consciousness and 
the captain gave him water. “ Colonel,” he whispered, 
“ I didn’t know — never guessed ” 

“ All right, Merton,” Stimson interrupted. “ How 
are you now ? ” 

“ All in, Colonel. I'm going — going out soon ” 

“ Bosh ! That hole in you is nothing. I’ll fix you 
up as good as ever. Don’t play the baby.” 

“ No use, Colonel. I was half dead when I got this. 

308 


The Battle in the Gulch 


Nothing left to pull from. It's killed me — over 
there ” he waved an arm toward the east. 

“ Over where ? ” asked Stimson, quickly. 

“ Chatham Island — the convict settlement, — where 
I was sent after — you know.” There was a long pause , 
and Merton's eyes were closed. I thought he had 
died, but Stimson still held up his head. Then he 
spoke again, his voice lowered, his eyes still shut. 

“ We mutinied — did for our guards — captured the 
schooner and escaped. Some of us came here, for we 
knew there was fruit and food here ; the rest tried to 
make Mexico with the boat. We found you here and 
we had to get you — only I didn't guess who you were. 
I ” 

“How came the fruit here? the horses, cows?” 
Stimson questioned eagerly. 

“ Used to be a settlement back in the '30s ; Floreana, 
they called it. They gave it up, but that's the why of the 
trees and animals. Will you say good-bye, Colonel? ” 

“ Good-bye, Merton. It's a hard end.” 

“ To a hard life and a bad life. I got what's coming, 
and there’s no blame to any but me. Will you shake 
my hand, Colonel ? ” 

Stimson motioned me and I took Merton's head in 
my arms while Stimson grasped the dying man's hand 
with his left. “ The other isn't working just now,” he 
explained, grimly. 

“ Did I get ye, Colonel ? ” asked Merton, his lips 
spreading into a smile. 


309 


Castaway Island 

“ You always could shoot,” the captain answered, 
and he held the hand firmly. For a long time Merton 
lay passive, seemingly unconscious, then his lips moved 
and Stimson bent down to hear. 

“ Watch ’em, Colonel,” he whispered faintly. 
‘‘They’re just plain brutes. They’ll kill ye if they 
can. And cowards.” His head was heavy in my 
arms. “ Twoscore or more of ’em,” he breathed ; “ but 
if you can — can signal — to the ” Words stopped. 

“Signal who?” cried Stimson, eagerly, anxiously. 
There was no reply, could be no reply ; Merton was 
dead. 

Night had fallen and the tropic stars shone down on 
the stark form of Stimson’s black-sheep Tatterdemalion, 
dead in a lonely gulch on a lonely isle, a smile still on 
his lips, for his captain had held his hand in the dark 
valley ; and there we left him, creeping away through 
the shadows, dodging from rock to tree, hiding in the 
thickets and behind the bank of the stream, back to 
Black Prince and Dan ; and a few minutes later we 
were sending the horses, only too willing to fly, up the 
side of the canyon in zigzag; ascent. Once at the 
top, Black Prince led the way at a gallop and I fol- 
lowed on Dan, straight westward across the moor. 
From the scrub at the edge of the stream came shots 
'and cries, but I neither looked behind nor raised the 
rifle, and we were beyond the range of muskets in a 
minute. 


310 



CHAPTER XXV 
CONCLUSION 

I T was forty-eight hours later, and Stimson and I, 
weary, weak and feverish of thirst and hunger, lay 
hidden in a hollow of the moor. Rags was asleep beside 
me, whining softly now and then, but Dan and Black 
Prince had been sent back to their mates in the hills, 
driven away to save their lives. We were being hunted 
like animals by men more cruel than beasts, a,nd there 
was no ammunition left for the revolver, and but a 
few cartridges for the rifle. 

Stimson had fought hard and long and, while he 
could sit a horse, none of the enemy had dared close in 
on us or get within range of his Mauser ; but he 
was no longer able to ride or shoot. The wound was 
such that we could not bind it properly, and loss of 
blood had drained his strength. We had run into the 
convicts twice during the first night, either by chance 
3*i 


Castaway Island 

or because they outguessed us, heading us off, and all 
the day we were standing off pursuers and being forced 
in a circle that was gradually narrowing. The first 
time Stimson fell from Black Prince I helped him up 
again, and he held on somehow for an hour or more, 
long enough for us to find the slender shelter where we 
now lay hidden. Then, as darkness fell, we drove 
away the horses and crept down into the grass and 
tangle of the hollow. 

It was on the hillside which overlooked Ostrich Bay 
and there was hardly a tree upon it for miles ; just 
grass, sage and cacti. In the morning the convicts 
would track us to this hiding place, without a doubt, 
and I should make our last stand alone, for Stimson 
was not able to hold a gun, and his revolver was use- 
less ; the musket had somehow been lost, left behind 
with our packs, most probably. 

I counted the remaining cartridges, feeling them in 
the dark ; there were twelve. There were powder and 
shot for the gun, but the shot was small for killing 
birds and game. It would hold off close attack for 
a time, but was no match for the muskets opposed 
to us. 

Stimson was asleep or in a stupor beside me ; Rags, 
snuggling close to my breast, whined softly with thirst 
and hunger ; I lay on my back and stared at the stars. 
The great adventure was over. We had fought and 
lost. Our island — ours no longer — would to-morrow 
see the end. Well, I had lived for a time, and in that 
312 


Conclusion 


living had learned a reliance and confidence that taught 
me how to die. I would not tremble with fear when 
the hour came. I had learned from a man how to live 
or how to meet life’s end. 

I reached my hand to Stimson’s beside me, and his* 
fingers closed over mine ; and I slept. 

I was counting the strokes of a bell in my sleep : 
ding, ding ; ding, ding ; we were on the “ Sally B,” 
sailing away across peaceful seas to a blue-white light. 
Ding, ding ; ding, ding ; eight bells. Before they had 
ceased, I was counting them awake. “ Eight bells ! ” 
I said aloud. 

Stimson stirred and spoke. “ What is it, Bob? ” he 
asked weakly. 

“ Eight bells/ 7 I replied, and the wonder of it came 
to my waking realization. “ Eight bells, Captain ! 77 
I repeated, springing to my feet. “ Did you hear ? A 
ship’s bell — out yonder at sea l 77 

“ You are dreaming, Bobbin. Lie down, lad. 77 

11 1 heard a ship’s bell, 77 I cried. “ I am not dream- 
ing — I heard — I heard ! Captain, there is a ship — I 
know ! What is the time — your watch ? 77 

He sat up now, for my certainty was convincing, 
and I held a match while he pulled out his watch. It 
was a minute after twelve. “ Odd, 77 he said, looking 
at it even after the match had burned out. “ It is 
eight bells, Bob ! 77 

“ I heard it, Captain. Just as sure as I 7 m awake 
now, I heard a ship’s bell. At first it was in my sleep, 
3i3 


Castaway Island 

but I woke up while it still rang. I am going to see — 
to find the ship ! ” 

“ Wait, Bob ; a half hour will decide it with cer- 
4 tainty. Sit here, and if the bell rings again, we shall 
go together.” 

That half hour seemed four hours long. We looked 
at the watch a dozen times, held it to our ears to be 
sure it had not stopped. When it was a few minutes 
of the time we stood up, my arm about the captain, so 
that we might hear more distinctly. Would it come, 
clear and resonant through the still air, or must I go 
back into hiding with its certainties of the morrow, 
admitting I had dreamed ? 

“ Ding ! ” One bell. 

Stimson strengthened instantly. “ Saved, Bobbin 
lad ! ” he cried, and his left arm clasped me tight 
against him. “ She’s in the bay — Ostrich Bay ! Come 
on ! ” and we struggled up the tangled side of the 
hollow, I leading and helping him. 

“ The light ! The white light ! ” I cried as I topped 
the rise. There, down the long slope, closer and bigger 
than it had ever been before, was the blue-white flame. 
From it, striking the sea before it, was a fan-like glow 
that made a circle upon the black, night water. 

“She’s on our oyster beds, Captain!” I cried, but 
he was running, staggering, down the declivity. 

“ Come on, Bob ! ” he shouted back to me. “ Beat 
me if you can, but run for it ! ” 

Behind us, far away and indistinct, I heard musket 
3i4 


Conclusion 


shots, but I only laughed as I caught up with Stimson, 
running at his side. “ They’re shooting at the stars, ” 
I said. “ Take my arm, Captain.” 

“ If I need — later, perhaps. Keep going.” 

It was still a mile ahead to the beach of the cove and 
the moor was not easy running, even in daylight. We 
stumbled time and again, and I was soon aiding Stim- 
son with an arm about him and his left across my 
shoulder. Finally we staggered down the last hill to 
the beach and I sent a hail across the water to a 
schooner which lay, sails all snugged, in the cove. 

The answer came back in English : “ Ahoy there ! 
Who are ye ? ” 

Stimson had recovered his breath. “ Send in a boat 
for us,” he shouted. 

The great search-light swung around slowly until it 
picked us up and it rested on us. I heard the voices 
of men in discussion aboard the vessel, then a voice 
rang out. “ Are ye from Chatham ? ” 

“No. From the good, old United States!” answered 
Stimson, and a laugh came across the water. 

“Get up the divers and pull ashore, Stayne. See 
who these men are,” was the command on the schooner, 
and the search-light swung back to make a white spot 
on the water. 

Now I saw a small boat in the midst of the circle of 
light with two men aboard, one of whom worked a 
crank like a windlass, turning it round and round. 
Then the surface of the water beside the boat was 
3i5 


Castaway Island 

broken by the appearance of a steel-cased head with a 
glass front which reflected the glow. Slowly this 
strangely clad diver came up from the sea, climbing a 
ladder that hung from the boat's side. A second diver 
followed him, and in a minute came the splash of oars 
and the boat moved toward us, the search-light follow- 
ing it in. 

“ That is real pearl fishing/' said the captain, speak- 
ing low. “ They know how and have proper equip- 
ment." 

“ Why do they work at night? ” 

“ Less wind, perhaps, or more hours and more shell. 
The season’s short at best. But it explains the light, 
and I never once thought of it." 

“They are taking our pearls," I said mournfully, 
and Stimson laughed. 

“ Find out all about ’em before you take ’em aboard,” 
came a command from the schooner, as audible to us 
as the boatmen. 

“ You needn’t fear," Stimson answered. “ I’m down 
and out with a bullet in my shoulder and the lad’s 
starved and weak with thirst. We couldn’t do harm 
if we were inclined that way." 

“Fighting the convicts?" asked the man called 
Stayne, from the boat. 

“ Yes. There’s a band above ripe for anything, 
armed with muskets and rifles. You have saved us 
from them, and just in time." 

“ Drop them firearms on the beach and walk away 
316 


Conclusion 


from ’em/’ Stayne ordered and, as we obeyed, he 
called back to the schooner, '‘I guess they're O. K., 
Captain." 

“ All right ; take them in," came back from the 
ship. 

The boat grated on the beach and Stimson met the 
two men who came toward us, his left hand outstretched 
in greeting. “ I'm Stimson," he said, “ Jeffers Stimson, 
late of Ecuador, bound home to the U. S. ; and this is 
Robert Trevlin of San Francisco." 

Stayne turned and shouted to the schooner. “ Hear 
that, Captain ? " he roared. 

“Hear what? No." 

“ Robert Trevlin's one of these beachers." 

“Trevlin? Not " 

“ Yes. Robert Trevlin — him with the reward " 

“ Fetch 'em aboard ! " shouted the captain. 

Stimson smiled at me as we helped him to a seat in 
the bows. “Seem to be known to them, Bob," he said. 

“ What does it mean ? " I asked, but Stayne answered 
the question with another. 

“ Be you the millionaire Trevlin boy as was lost in 
Guayaquil some six months ago ? " he asked. 

“ Yes — I guess so," I answered, not daring to look at 
Stimson. Why had I not told him when I had a 
chance ? How would he feel to me now, knowing I 
had deceived him by silence? 

“ I guess you'll be very welcome aboard the * Mari- 
ana,' " continued the fisherman. “ They's a handsome 
3i7 


Castaway Island 

reward for any information of you, and it doubles if 
you're found. We all greet you fondly, Mister Trevlin.” 

I made no answer, for we were against the schooner's 
side and scrambled over its rail. That ship’s captain 
— Stubbs was his name, we found — had loads of com- 
mon sense, for he greeted us with dippers of water, not 
hand-shakes, and he had us inside his cabin before a 
tableful of food before he began to ask questions. 
While he listened to our story, he patched up Stimson’s 
wound, making better surgery of it than I had been 
able to do, and gave much more reassurance as to its 
condition. “ A clean cut, in and out again,” he de- 
clared. “ No bones broken and no complications to 
fear.” 

We arranged without difficulty for passage on the 
“ Mariana.” The schooner had been working the beds 
of a little atoll that lay about twenty miles southwest 
of our island, so close to the water that we had not been 
able to see it even with the binoculars. In the lagoon 
of this circular strip of coral the “ Mariana ” had been 
anchored each time we had seen the light, making 
frequent trips to Guayaquil for supplies and to dispose 
of the shell and pearls. Night work was her specialty, 
for the winds were usually dead at night and the 
search-light gave a luminosity which penetrated to the 
bottom even in deep water. It was this great electric 
light that had caused us to wonder at its mystery and 
talk of “ Flying Dutchmen ” and St. Elmo's lights. 

Captain Stubbs declared I was more valuable cargo 
318 


Conclusion 


than all the pearls he had gathered on his cruise and 
offered to make the run direct to San Francisco. “ I 
don’t want to divide the reward with any of these 
Ecuadoran officials,” he explained. “ I’ll put the lad 
into his uncle’s hands in Frisco, and no splits with any 
one. It may sound selfish, Stimson, but we pearl divers 
are not in business for our health.” 

“ You needn’t apologize,” Stimson answered. “We’re 
both able to pay our way,” and he gave me a smile 
which cheered me. Apart from what was waiting for 
me in San Francisco we were not poor, with a black 
pearl and a Chinese Buddha. 

Captain Stubbs turned his cabin over to us, disre- 
garding our protests, and bunked in with the mate. 
As he was leaving, Stimson asked what would be done 
about the convicts (escaped from Chatham Island, and 
Stubbs said he would report it at San Francisco through 
the Ecuadoran consulate there. When he had closed 
the door behind him, Stimson, comfortable in the lower 
berth, spoke to me. “ So, Bobbin, you had no need 
to work in the stoke-hole or before the mast to earn 
passage up? ” he asked, and his eyes were smiling. 

“ I — I’m afraid I didn’t, Captain. I — I ” 

“ You just wanted a friend ; wasn’t it that, lad ? ” I 
nodded. " You wanted some one you liked and who 
liked you, just as I did like you the minute I saw 
you, and you didn’t care a bit whether he was rich or 
poor, prince or pauper. You might have hired the 
whole cabin deck of the ‘ Mariposa,’ but you preferred 
3i9 


Castaway Island 

the fo’castle of the 1 Sally B ’ and a friend. Bob, give 
my bad right hand a shake ; I’m willing to stand the 
pain for the sake of such a friendship.” 

I didn’t see just how he had twisted it around that 
way, making me the one who had given, when all I 
had done was to receive friendship and accept grate- 
fully, but I squeezed his hand gently, glad that he 
held no blame for my silent acquiescence of his mis- 
take. When I was settled in my bunk with Rags 
curled up in a fat little ball at my feet, I spoke of an- 
other matter. Outside I could hear the groaning cap- 
stan jerking the anchor from the mud ; gruff orders 
and responses and the scuffling feet of the crew hurry- 
ing sails on spars and booms ; and I knew that when 
my eyes opened from coming slumber we should be 
bowling northward, homeward. 

“ Captain,” I said eagerly, “ we shall go back some 
day — back to our island together — to Lake Plentiful 
and the bamboo cabin, the grove and the palms, to Black 
Prince and Dan, who will be waiting for us — and the 
cows and chickens. You will go with me, Captain ? ” 

“ Some day — yes, Bob ; God willing.” 

“ And Rags shall watch for us then. He can bring 
back sticks already, Captain ! He’s going to be a grand 
watch-dog, is Rags ! ” 

Hearing his name, Rags cocked an ear, opened an 
eye and whined happily. 


705 


320 

















































. V * 

cP % \WM; 

y * \ \ ^ ^ *'o > k ^ A ' d ^"j * * 

°* A . o«c. *b ** .(V • ll ** .** ‘ M* ♦* °o 



, 0 >‘ ^ ^ ° -V 

** * *+ **^$SrS 

' 0 * *> * rf \ X 0 « C . '^ // ' * * ' S ,y? \ * v ' B « "<P " 


4 y % -*w * 

,\ ' % ''7 ^',' .** - 

*> e ^ v v. ' ^ ^ v v 



• aV </» ^ o v> ^ 

* .-\v ^ * 

* \ '* 7 V 'V -c. 

'/-,. ' **' ^ .V . 


c/'° • k / X s c «%>!' * " ° ^ 

„ ^ ** • csSS^', ° 0 '' m 




o 0 N 
H 'A 



0> 

\V- y 

,, ^ ’ ~° o'* »<*•* -'c 


\V v- * u* 

1 ,V^ ^ <3 >> % «?* 

vi* '^.^ v 


,%' ~V, ', 

.' **• *f, *t 

X s'” ',„ "> 



\ 0< ^. 


^ % '• 

CK * ^ /'^' v 

* A O '' i s s *G 

0 N C „ -/> 0 * s *s 

♦ - O- f 0 V V* 

V ^ 



>- Q£yO 
* 

3 K 0 * 8 i \ 

AV 4 „ X * « y *Q 




* y V '. 


,■ V * si ■ > ' '-^ .' 

s * rfk^L- % l +r <* 

i l i* >, 


X 



o 5 ~Cu '■ 

<■ „ v** ^ ■ 

' ">' V'»»?o 


*~T4A/ ' A 

O ^ \ a > 

^ *i.'* ^ s **,* 

^ V v S ^^.>y 

^/l% ^ .v. * fmb% « 

** ** 


55 ^ vV ^ 

y ^ 

2 * * 
v> ^ 

V, <<» v> 

a v ’ * 

v \ > V / ■'Jk 

* / _ S S <G y 0 S 

0 * 1 ' * « *'•? v^ c 

c *\««^% *,, ^ ,* 





X, -A . ^ _ 

A v 

X 0o x. - ^ 

0 o * 

■> ^ 0 J o, 

% / '^ v e \ # VjSfct -v 

y % v®8? • y % i,w,* * •■* * 

'"•^ A* 0 „ c/^.- >’ .... C, , °- l ' k ,A A o h o 

.# .'• rW ,. *# ° 0 o° y ***, * f y . c 

♦ ^ i x * >$ 




^ v^' 


\° °<. 



•x, " ^ .\- 

ct- s yV 

'\ ' ' «<,^ s v 

^ ,*0- v* 



*n'* s ,, f ^M 0 ’/ 

V x ^ .0' %' * ° f 

X -**.A 7ms. ^ A 


' <& 

; ‘ 

r ^ *V> ♦ 

/h o ~<J> .Vv o 

v. z ^y z 

<V> 

y £>' * y 

V/ - sS <° , , c - ^ ,, 

,0‘ « vU ^ ^ ^ c 0 






\ 

» . v V V v 

® ^ y 

y‘ x °y - ^|f|riy ° • ^ 'y ° 

V- >^sp*r. v * . . 

O, “V , S ,0 <* v 0 0 x ^ /' 

'^* ' * 4 s I'S v ^ c 

* 

f y y ~ ^ ^ C 



, 0 ^ 


/ 

''oo' 

A*. 

*» 

•«* 

^ -nt 

/ 




LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 





